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Old 28-05-2010, 03:03 PM
TrevorW
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Atik 383
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Old 28-05-2010, 03:19 PM
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Atik 383
Wish they'd hurry up with the new filter wheel to go with it.
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Old 28-05-2010, 03:40 PM
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Is interesting looking at all these different variations of the same thing. I wonder why QSI had internal 1.25" filter wheel but SBIG says you need bigger than 1.25" ? Is that just because the SBIG filters are further from the chip? Or does the QSI have some vignetting?


Simply because the QSI unit is all in 1 and the filters are so colse to
the sensor that they dont vignete . If you want there is 31mm option
for same cost.
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  #24  
Old 28-05-2010, 03:59 PM
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I have a FLI ML8300.

Good points - the best cooling of any manufacturer, the lowest read noise of any manufacturer, the fastest download times, the Microline is small and light the Proline would be rather large and heavy and overkill for this chip.

It has an image buffer. To connect the camera using CCDsoft takes about 1 second and the drivers are stored in the camera once connected so you can disconnect it from the computer and reconnect it and it is still going at its cold temperature. SBig cameras need to be rebooted from scratch if you interrupt the power supply (easy to do due to the extremely low quality power plug in the ST402 and 8300 body) and takes a little while. It also loses it cooling and has to do it again.
A very annoying aspect of the SBIG and a bit antiquated.
FLI ML8300 gets me -35C in summer and -40C in winter easily. It cools in about 5 minutes. It has a very stable and high quality power plug.
It has no bad points as a camera.

FLI make several filter wheels all are compatible with their 2 model cameras. I use the CFW 4/5 as I also use it with a Proline 16803.
The filter wheel uses a plastic chain to ensure exact repeatability and a solid filter wheel carousel which prevents dust getting in to the camera.
Apogee has cutouts and can let some dust through.
The FLI filterwheel has a large opening and to attach an adapter you have a fairly shallow thread depth and this needs to be known to suppliers of adapters as I have had to grind a couple down to make them fit otherwise they jam the carousel. FLI seem to be associated with Maxim DL but also works in CCDSoft which is what I use.

Apogee also make a nice 8300 camera although the cooldown time is about 30 minutes but it gets cold to -50C.

QSI also make a nice 8300 camera with the built in off axis guider model and built in filter wheel. But its cooling is weaker at up -40.

The FLI also has the plus of a very large opening for the chip so there is no chance of vignetting. Also their adapters have a V cut in them and a grub screw to engage so it is very positive and solid and self aligning which is another piece of clever engineering.

FLI is simply the best. Ask Richard Crisp who is a CCD engineer and routinely tests various astronomy cameras for performance and FLI has beaten them all. Apogee is another close contender. The slow cooling is my only concern with Apogee but in every other way they are also excellent. Except perhaps for the cutouts in the filter which is otherwise a marvel.

Greg.
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Old 28-05-2010, 04:56 PM
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I have a FLI ML8300.

Good points - the best cooling of any manufacturer, the lowest read noise of any manufacturer, the fastest download times, the Microline is small and light the Proline would be rather large and heavy and overkill for this chip.

It has an image buffer. To connect the camera using CCDsoft takes about 1 second and the drivers are stored in the camera once connected so you can disconnect it from the computer and reconnect it and it is still going at its cold temperature. SBig cameras need to be rebooted from scratch if you interrupt the power supply (easy to do due to the extremely low quality power plug in the ST402 and 8300 body) and takes a little while. It also loses it cooling and has to do it again.
A very annoying aspect of the SBIG and a bit antiquated.
FLI ML8300 gets me -35C in summer and -40C in winter easily. It cools in about 5 minutes. It has a very stable and high quality power plug.
It has no bad points as a camera.

FLI make several filter wheels all are compatible with their 2 model cameras. I use the CFW 4/5 as I also use it with a Proline 16803.
The filter wheel uses a plastic chain to ensure exact repeatability and a solid filter wheel carousel which prevents dust getting in to the camera.
Apogee has cutouts and can let some dust through.
The FLI filterwheel has a large opening and to attach an adapter you have a fairly shallow thread depth and this needs to be known to suppliers of adapters as I have had to grind a couple down to make them fit otherwise they jam the carousel. FLI seem to be associated with Maxim DL but also works in CCDSoft which is what I use.

Apogee also make a nice 8300 camera although the cooldown time is about 30 minutes but it gets cold to -50C.

QSI also make a nice 8300 camera with the built in off axis guider model and built in filter wheel. But its cooling is weaker at up -40.

The FLI also has the plus of a very large opening for the chip so there is no chance of vignetting. Also their adapters have a V cut in them and a grub screw to engage so it is very positive and solid and self aligning which is another piece of clever engineering.

FLI is simply the best. Ask Richard Crisp who is a CCD engineer and routinely tests various astronomy cameras for performance and FLI has beaten them all. Apogee is another close contender. The slow cooling is my only concern with Apogee but in every other way they are also excellent. Except perhaps for the cutouts in the filter which is otherwise a marvel.

Greg.
Greg...a couple of questions. How much does the ML8300 cost and how does it stack up to the Proline version.
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Old 28-05-2010, 07:35 PM
Hans Tucker (Hans)
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So there is a block when ordering through opt?
For SBIG products...yes
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  #27  
Old 28-05-2010, 08:00 PM
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KAI-11002 sensor prices continue to fall at a slow rate given they're no longer "king of the chips" with 16803 around. There's probably a good reason why you want to stick it out with the 8300. I'd play my cards differently...
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Old 28-05-2010, 08:38 PM
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Originally Posted by renormalised View Post
Greg...a couple of questions. How much does the ML8300 cost and how does it stack up to the Proline version.
Not sure of the current cost of the FLI ML8300 - I think its around US$3995 and there are a few filter wheels but the one I am using I think is around US$895.

The Proline I have is the 16803. It requires 50mm square filters. I have both Baader and Astronomik. They are both good.

Proline is quite a large and heavy camera and I don't see any real advantage here for the 8300. The Proline has heavier cooling power
has a built in USB and power hub and I think a larger aperture.
It is more for the larger chips.

As Jase mentioned the 11002 chip is cheaper nowadays and probably the better imaging chip as an all rounder as 95% of all top images on the net today are using the 11002 chip. It allows you an upgrade path of your scopes without needing to upgrade the chip.

The 8300 chip is very good but its main weakness is small well capacity of 25,000 electrons or less. 16803 is more like 100,000 or more.
What that means is that bright stars can spill over more easily than with some of the other chips. On the other hand it has QE of about 60% compared to the 11002 QE (sensitivity) of around 45-50%.



Greg.
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Old 28-05-2010, 09:06 PM
Hans Tucker (Hans)
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I have the FLI CFW-2-7 which is a nice piece of engineering hence my interest in the FLI camera. Plus the customer service given by FLI is top rate. Thanks Greg for you concise post regarding the ML-8300.
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Old 28-05-2010, 10:50 PM
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Originally Posted by gregbradley View Post
Not sure of the current cost of the FLI ML8300 - I think its around US$3995 and there are a few filter wheels but the one I am using I think is around US$895.

The Proline I have is the 16803. It requires 50mm square filters. I have both Baader and Astronomik. They are both good.

Proline is quite a large and heavy camera and I don't see any real advantage here for the 8300. The Proline has heavier cooling power
has a built in USB and power hub and I think a larger aperture.
It is more for the larger chips.

As Jase mentioned the 11002 chip is cheaper nowadays and probably the better imaging chip as an all rounder as 95% of all top images on the net today are using the 11002 chip. It allows you an upgrade path of your scopes without needing to upgrade the chip.

The 8300 chip is very good but its main weakness is small well capacity of 25,000 electrons or less. 16803 is more like 100,000 or more.
What that means is that bright stars can spill over more easily than with some of the other chips. On the other hand it has QE of about 60% compared to the 11002 QE (sensitivity) of around 45-50%.



Greg.
Thanks, Greg
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  #31  
Old 29-05-2010, 01:50 AM
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Can't Robin..offshore sellers will not sell to Aussie buyers because there is an authorised Australian agent for SBIG.
Why not see if these guys can buy it in the states for you: PriceUSA
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  #32  
Old 29-05-2010, 12:05 PM
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Old hat information; Helps to understand CCD camera nomenclature before delving too deep on the report.
http://www.narrowbandimaging.com/U83...eport_page.htm

EDIT:
http://www.narrowbandimaging.com/ima...ison_brief.pdf
Now includes QSI

Last edited by jase; 29-05-2010 at 12:09 PM. Reason: EDIT: Another report that includes the QSI
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Old 29-05-2010, 12:14 PM
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Simply because the QSI unit is all in 1 and the filters are so colse to the sensor that they dont vignete . If you want there is 31mm option for same cost.
Quote:
Is interesting looking at all these different variations of the same thing. I wonder why QSI had internal 1.25" filter wheel but SBIG says you need bigger than 1.25" ? Is that just because the SBIG filters are further from the chip? Or does the QSI have some vignetting?
I shot some images on a qsi583 with the 1.25 filters last week with a tak fsq106 at prime. It DOES vignette. I suppose it could be flated out, but I was playing around and didnt get too serious about calibrations.

It may not on slower scopes with a shallower light cone, I didnt test it though.

Brett
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Old 29-05-2010, 01:25 PM
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I shot some images on a qsi583 with the 1.25 filters last week with a tak fsq106 at prime. It DOES vignette. I suppose it could be flated out, but I was playing around and didnt get too serious about calibrations.

It may not on slower scopes with a shallower light cone, I didnt test it though.

Brett
How badly? Got images? Would be handy to see for those contemplating these cameras to see some real results.
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Old 29-05-2010, 01:47 PM
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I didnt keep the images unfortunetly.

I was at a friends observatory, and the images are on his observatory computer. It was first (ccd) light for his new observatory. The sensor is very clean especially compared to my sbig.

I took some 1 minute luminance exposures and vignetting was clearly visible. I have not processed any of the images as we started the beers in celebration (Coopers vintage 2005) of the first image on the screen.

I do know that it is the camera though not the FSQ106ed with its legendary abilty to evenly illuminate a field. I do not think it would be such a problem with slower scopes.

Brett
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Old 29-05-2010, 02:51 PM
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Quote:
Originally Posted by bert View Post
I shot some images on a qsi583 with the 1.25 filters last week with a tak fsq106 at prime. It DOES vignette. I suppose it could be flated out, but I was playing around and didnt get too serious about calibrations.

It may not on slower scopes with a shallower light cone, I didnt test it though.
That is why SBIG advises not to use 1.25" Filters and why they have gone to 36mm Filters..to eliminate vignetting at an economical price. An alternate option to going up to 2" Filters which is what I elected to do.
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Old 29-05-2010, 04:53 PM
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That is why SBIG advises not to use 1.25" Filters and why they have gone to 36mm Filters..to eliminate vignetting at an economical price. An alternate option to going up to 2" Filters which is what I elected to do.
A good option, and smart thinking, as it allows for the next upgrade. In the qsi's defence they did design the filter wheel to be very close to the sensor as possible (as opposed to sbig's shortcut of using the st402 type chassis and tack on a filter wheel), cools pretty quickly, is very quiet, smaller than it looks in the ad, and light and as mentioned earlier it is very clean and noise free.

I think jase's comment about saving for the 11002 chip is the best option, from what I have seen, I think that the 8300 chip is suitable for widefield but pretty average for longer focal lengths. (Sbig's stl11k is priced pretty attractively atm imho)

Brett

Last edited by bert; 29-05-2010 at 05:47 PM.
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Old 29-05-2010, 05:43 PM
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I didnt keep the images unfortunetly.

I was at a friends observatory, and the images are on his observatory computer. It was first (ccd) light for his new observatory. The sensor is very clean especially compared to my sbig.

I took some 1 minute luminance exposures and vignetting was clearly visible. I have not processed any of the images as we started the beers in celebration (Coopers vintage 2005) of the first image on the screen.

I do know that it is the camera though not the FSQ106ed with its legendary abilty to evenly illuminate a field. I do not think it would be such a problem with slower scopes.

Brett
Sure the vignetting wasn't caused by tunnel vision induced by all those Coppers ales??!!!!
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Old 29-05-2010, 05:57 PM
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According to the SBIG site they say that with 1.25" filters they'll vignette in scopes f6 and faster. I've a full set of 1.25" lrgb and narrowband filters that I've not tried with the ST-8300 yet (ps looking for a 7 position motorized wheel). None of my scopes are faster than f7.5, so I'll be trying the 1.25" filters before I consider upgrading.
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Old 29-05-2010, 05:58 PM
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If you're looking at a 11002 chip camera at a good price, the Moravian Instruments G3-11000 (mono) is going for $6316, sans GST ($6947 w GST), at the current exchange rate with the EU. That's with an internal filter wheel and a Class 1 CCD. Without the fw...$6015 ($6616), and colour version. Class 2 CCD's without fw and colour $5325 ($5837). With fw (mono) $5626 ($6188).
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