Stellarium + netbook

[Polmear]

I loaded Stellarium on my netbook and took it outside. I find it a lot easier to use than a paper star chart. Not only does it glow in the dark, but zooming in and out is a great way to match unaided and binocular views. And with a netbook you can wander around like it's a book.

I was looking in particular for Sigma Octantis, and hey presto, there it was. OK it took a few goes, but at least I know what to look for now.

A pretty neat way to learn the sky.

Tim

[stephenb]

I'm seriously thinking of buying a netbook for the same use. Tim, did you find the brightness of the screen affect your night vision?

[Polmear]

I use a sheet of red acetate sheet so that slips between the LCD and the screen bezel and set Stellarium to night mode. I was also running the netbook on its battery,so the screen was a little dimmer anyway. While I think there was some loss of night vision (I could barely make out 5th magnitude stars unaided) I could have turned down the screen even further.

[renormalised]

Those little netbooks are pretty dandy:)

Wouldn't mind one myself...much easier than lugging a notebook out into the yard or into the field.

[Irish stargazer]

Netbooks are the biz. I use my Samsung netbook for Stellarium, taking AVI's of planets and autoguiding. The battery lasts for hours. Its nice to be able to hold the screen up close with one hand and have the other free for focusing, adjusting the mount etc. It will even run registax.

[mikerr]

What would be the minimum requirements for a Netbook to do the things we need here. I have a Laptop but have not even seen a Netbook.
Any Model/Brands that you guys are using and happy with would be appreciated and would give me somewhere to start looking.
I do like Windows 7 on my Laptop.

Michael

[Irish stargazer]

I have a basic Intel Atom running XP. I like the Samsung as they are very solid, great battery life (6-8 hours) and mid-price range (can be picked up for $300 new). Asus and Toshiba are good for reliability but check battery life which is the most useful aspect.

[Barrykgerdes]

When these netbooks were released I bought an asus. It was the cheapest and only had 1 GB of memory with XP. I have yet to find a program that I commonly use that will not run fully. I think the later releases are faster but I think XP will be better than Widows 7 because of memory requirements

I regularly compile Stellarium from source

I run Photoshop, Adobe Pro, PHD, Nebulosity 2, DSS, etc. The memory intensive programs are much slower but still work.

Battery life depends on the batteries fitted and how you use it. I only get 3 hours with intensive use. Although most of my usage is with the charger running.

Barry

[mikerr]

John and Barry, thanks for the replies.
I ahve no problem with XP and think it is a very stable OS. It makes sense as you say, to not bog a little computer down unnecessarily with Win 7.
You have given me somwhwere to start. Thanks.

Michael.

P.S. Barry, what do you mean "I regularly compile Stellarium from source " ? :question:
I just have it as desktop icon on my Laptop and run it from there. Hope that makes sense.

[dannat]

Cough cough iPad

Seriously though if you get a net book get one that you can upgrade the hdd to a ssd. It will improve it & you can get a 64gb one for a 100

[BrisGreg]

An iPad running Sky Safari ticks all the boxes. Long battery life (10 hrs), night colour mode, telrad circles,convenient size...;)

[Barrykgerdes]

Hi Mike
I belong to the development team that writes Stellarium and I download the latest source code daily and develop it into the latest version of the program. If you have version 0.10.6.1 (from stellarium.org) you can update it to the latest level by getting this patch and installing it.
http://barry.sarcasmogerdes.com/stellarium/uploads/stellarium-patch0107.zip

Barry

[Irish stargazer]

Can you connect a camera or autoguider to an Ipad though? The reason I like netbooks is that they are relatively cheap and if you drop one in the dark or it gets sodden with moisture its not your $1500 lappy that bites the dust. IPads would be great for running planetarium software if thats all you need but they are the price of a modest laptop, which while not as sleek or convenient, can do more tasks. Mind you, I have never owned an IPad, IPod or IPhone. Perhaps the "I's" have it ;)

[Satchmo]

I saw netbooks in Officeworks the other day for $250. Talk about bang for buck.

[BrisGreg]

SkySafari has a scope interface but I don't use it. The iPad is such an amazing piece of kit. 30000000 million people can't be wrong. What do I use it for? Web browsing,astronomy apps,mail,facebook,watching movies, reading magazines, uploading piccies from my camera et al but I still need a pc for mmmmm. Nuthin! ( not really. ITunes is on my pc)

[pmrid]

Hyperbole, now that's what I call hyperbole.


But seriously folks, I had sworn off Stellarium for a good while - it seemed to be a bit of a resource hog. But I have just revisited it and it has become quite slick while i wasn't looking.
I think it will definitely go back on the Netbook at the very least.
Peter.

[Barrykgerdes]

Stellarium being a real time updater will hog as much of the processor as it can. You can check this by the frame rate in the menu panel. If you have a fast processor and screen display card it will update perhaps 80 times/second.

To share the processor with other programs you can go to the config.ini file and edit the entries under [video] set the maximum_fps to something like 30 and the Minimum_fps to about 4

Now if you have a very fast computer the maximum frame rate will be about 30fps and when the screen is steady it will drop to 4 fps. This slow update will allow the processor to do other things while stellarium is idling along. As soon as you put the mouse on to the screen and start to do something the frame rate will climb instantly to your maximum then drop back to the minimum when that task is complete.

Try it

Barry

PS do you mean Julia's hyperbowl or the dictionary's hyperrrbolee

[BrisGreg]

I stand corrected. With Australian sales its now 8.2 gzillion (give or take)
What's this about hyperbole you say?

[pmrid]

Hi Barry. I would if I could but I'm blowed if I can find a config.ini file in the Stellarium sub-dir.
I'm running it in Win7. That make a difference?
Peter

[Barrykgerdes]

Hi Peter
It's in the users\[your name]\appdata\roaming\stellarium folder.
appdata is a hidden file
To confirm the location run stellarium and go to help (F1) and select log
read down the entry and it will say writing to c:\users -------

To make the hidden file visible goto tools - folder options - view and tick the show hidden files.

Barry

[Barrykgerdes]

Forget it, it's a political comment about pronunciation
Barry

[pmrid]

Thanks Barry. Got that.
Peter

[stephenb]

Barry, has there been any discussion in the Stellarium circles about creating a more "user-friendly" interface for loading/accessing/amending the config file? Say, through the icon interface already in the menu? If it is already there, I apologise, I can't seem to find it.

Stephen

[Barrykgerdes]

It has been mentioned but no specific changes have been made. Modifying some of the items in the config.ini file is a specialist task. However all the items that are normally user configurable can be changed from within the program.

There are two methods of changing config.ini items. They can be changed from the various menus or they can be changed via the Text user interface plug in. To use the second make sure it is loaded at start up by ticking the box. This second method is good for changing colours

To make your changes permanent use the configure menu (F2) and make sure you click on save changes.

The biggest problem with the config.ini file is finding it. All user configurable items are held in the computer user area in a hidden file. This makes it difficult for many to find. The location of this "stellarium" folder is listed in the help menu (F1) by reading the log. It is the first entry and mentioned again further down the panel.

Because the application data or appdata file is a hidden file in Windows it can't be found with a simple search. You can address it from the command prompt or you can make hidden files visible from the tools-options-view menu.

When you locate this area it is the place to store your large star catalogues, scripts,extra textures, extra nebulae, data. extra landscapes and modules. Stellarium looks in this area first before using the corresponding entry in the main stellarium folder. Thus an update or new version of stellarium will not overwrite your special data.

Barry

[Stu Ward]

I bought an Acer Aspire one netbook yesterday.
$246 from Office Works
Chucked Canon Eos Utility and Stellarium on there. Works a charm

Stu

[Irish stargazer]

Can't go wrong for that price. Bargain!
If it gets accidently dropped on a dark night, it won't break the bank to replace it either. As they are smaller and lighter they are probably less lightly to be knocked over or dropped than a standard laptop. Anyone have any laptop disasters out at the scope?

[steve000]

Totally agree with Stallarium and a netbook.. Version 10.6 fixed the weird resoloution issue, it runs about 25fps and works well on most netbooks.. Honestly id be lost without it.

I find i actually have the netbook brightness 1 level up from lowest setting, only to see the keyboard. a RED led fixed that

stellarium also has a red screen mode, and with wireless in range its handy to google things ive seen while observing.

highly recommend, On lowest brightness and lowest power my old eeepc used to get 10 hours, now makes around 7 hours as its heaps older.