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Mike,
Congrats on the new camera. I have the 21BF04, don't have any problems with 30fps. I use an older Sony laptop unit 256mB, 1.3Ghz, Mobile Athlon.
I rarely use IC Capture, prefer K3CCD which works fine. Cannot access
gamma control from K3 (since it is not exposed to the DirectShow intfc), but I don't find that a problem, I usually keep it at 1.0. To access gamma control I had to ask the Imaging Source for a firmware upgrade which they emailed me promptly, your camera probably already has that firmware.
I suspect the problem is more the video card or driver, can't be the hard disk. With an exp time of 1/32s I get an avg throughput of about 27fps onto a 4200 rpm internal disk. The preview sometimes freezes for a few frames, but the logging continues ok in K3. One nice thing about IC Capture is you can specify 'non-physical' units which allows exp times like 1/30, 1/31, 1/32 etc. From K3 you are limited to inverse powers of 2. My laptop froze often early on after I got it in 2001, before the DMK, and had to do more research (it was like work!) into drivers, BIOS upgrades and Windows XP fixes. I also have a Color Firewire Unibrain 500C which works ok until I get to 60fps, when the image breaks up in preview.
The biggest problem I have had is focusing in RGB. Although focusing a monochrome camera is easier, especially at low altitudes, the various colors focus at diff spots, and the JMI NGFCM did not provide repeatable positions according to the DRO unit, so I gave up on it and went to the Optec TCF-S. I've written sw for it so I can jump from red to grn to blue with recorded offsets. I'm still using a manual filter wheel so I need the extra help in the short time we have with Jupiter.
Sorry for the rambling, but I guess thats how information is shared. Thanks for posting your great results!
Glenn Jolly
Arizona, USA
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