no I dont mind at all, wow! nice work RB!

I am guessing here/ but you have run it through a noise reduction proggy and giving it a darkframe? and darkened it a bit mebbe too. its kinda lost a bit of the tail detail, but is certainly looking heaps better :-) not complaining tho
i expected the noise at that iso, naturally np, but the banding was definitely there before, unless that is all part of the same noise thing, but its at all iso's, if stretched.
here is a cropped close up section of same pic, using jpg only and stretched and sharpened to bring it out hopefully (i did once think that it was a jpg issue, and tried a converted to 16bit TIFF of same pic, it definately reduces it (the banding), but its still there to a certain extent.)
the banding isnt full on obvious I guess, its bit faint, i should of said before, but its still there.
i appreciate you taking the time to help me out here Andrew! I wish it was all in my imagination