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Old 16-04-2012, 01:10 PM
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marki
Waiting for next electron

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Join Date: Mar 2008
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Meru View Post
Thanks for the responses guys


Mark,
No don't persuade me to QHY again! Its taken me so long to narrow things down this far But definitely, the value (and from what I hear the service from Theo) is great. But his site does not mention the price of a QHY9 alone; Do you know what it is at the moment? And the thing is, if I buy from Optcorp it comes to about $3100 for the SBIG/2" EFW/2" Baader LRGB/NB. So for the extra $600, I feel like its more solid deal since the EFW with the QHY9 is a RS232 (not usb) and the 2" filters are QHY, not from Baader (which ive heard many great things about).
The FW is RS232 as it plugs straight into the camera via a short cord so there is no need to run a link back to the computer. It always worked without fail for me but I now use the FLI 2 - 7 unit as I want to load LRGB, SII, OIII and Ha in one wheel (big heavy sod of a thing, about 1 kg on its own). The QHY unit only has 5 slots so you can put Ha, LRGB in one wheel but it is compact and very light. I believe the SBIG unit takes 36mm filters which are cheaper but of no use if you want to upgrade your camera at a later stage to a larger chip and you would have to buy another set which is not cheap and you would have trouble selling the 36mm filters I imagine. The 9 wheel has 50mm filters (mounted or unmounted, both fit) so this is not a problem unless you went to the big kodak chip in which case you will need 65mm square units and by that stage money should be no object. Not sure about the filters as I use astronomik filters and the orange made filters that come with the QHY 9 were released well after I got my camera though I have seen some reasonable pics from them. Best way to find out what Theo is charging is to shoot him an email. With $600 to spare you can get a copy of MaximDL (with beer money left over, no make that spirits money) which does a whole lot more than just drive the camera and has to be the most complete astro program out there. It also integrates with the QHY9 nicely as with most other camera's. Interesting you have quoted OPT as a source, if you buy the camera from them you have no local warranty which means you have to send it back to the US everytime something goes wrong (if they will uphold warranty at all???) and being above $1000 the GST etc will apply. Have you factored in these costs? If you go SBIG you would be far better off buying it from Peter Ward locally as CCD camera's no matter what make can and do stop working as designed. User error is one of the greatest reasons for this but a power surge, accidental drop, moisture etc can also render your camera cactus and you really do need local backup.

Mark

Last edited by marki; 16-04-2012 at 01:25 PM.
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