Yep AutomapperII is nice for sure. A large mapping run is a piece of cake (unless your dome battery goes flat after about the 230th slew!
)
And don't be too hasty dismissing TheSkyX Greg. I've gone through the
entire setup and almost the whole shakedown procedure. TSX integrates well with CCDSoft (latest version ...206). It integrated with Automadome and CCDAP nicely as well - no hiccups at all. I have tested plate solves and dome slews & slaving etc only to find out that my nearly 6 year old laptop is just too old to handle the CPU load with everything running. TSX utilises multi core processors so a new laptop is coming soon!!
I have reverted to TS6 only because of my old laptop. I am actually writing a review of my experience with TSX and will complete it once my hardware is up to date.
You do not need to buy Pinpoint if you go TSX. The platesolves I did from CCDSoft were at least as accurate (and probably better) than TS6 with the USNO-A2.0 catalogue (once I downloaded and optimised the UCAC3 catalogue that is - for free).
IMO, TSX is worth checking out if you have a reasonably up to date PC! It is much more stable now than it was 6 months ago!!! The new interface alone is very slick too.
Cheers, Marcus