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I have a SX AO LF unit. I applied the fix suggested by Terry Platt (soldering the 2.2k resistor, very simple to do).
My SX AO LF unit works from my old Dell laptop with a Centrino processor (single core) 1.7 Gh, 2 GBytes, XP SP3. I normally run the guider at 0.1 seconds. If I get a bright enough star, I could run it much faster but I do not look for them. I use the guide camera (Lodestar) with bin 2x2 that is 1.2 arcs-second per pixel. It always, up to now, shows stars that are adequate for 0.1 or 0.2 frames per second. The cpu usage does not get over 30% and the average is about 15%. I can run AstroPlaner, SkyCharts and DeepSky stacker simultaneously with the tracking software.
My USB to Serial Port converter is a cheap one sold at Jaycar ($20 or $30). I use two of them, one for the serial port of my telescope and another one for the SX-AO unit. Both converters use the Prolific driver and both work with all software I have (PHD, AstroPlaner, SkyCharts, you name it and it works!).
I am now taking 15 minutes subs and the stars are round and small. I am using a focal length of 2865 mm at F8 even with some wind. This was impossible for me to do before I started using the SX-AO unit.
I am very happy with the SX-AO unit. I am attaching a raw picture taken with a QHY8 with the gear stated above. I converted the picture to Jpeg and compressed for uploading it.
Regards,
Enrique
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