All on one PC?

koputai (Jason) · #1 22-12-2010, 12:55 PM

Has anyone tried running two cameras plus their mount from one pc?

I want to run the following:

1x EQ6Pro (EQMOD)
1x Orion Starshoot Autoguider
1x SBIG Parallel camera

Before I go to the trouble of setting it all up, is it possible?

Cheers,
Jason.

Cosmic (Daniel) · #2 22-12-2010, 06:59 PM

Anything is possible.. you could also probably play a game as well

One question what is your CPU, duo quad i5 i7 what's the model. Simply if you have a good pc/laptop you should have a decent cpu and thats going to dictate whether or not you can run all this at once.

No harm will come trying. Hope this somewhat some help to you.

Cheers
Dan

Dennis · #3 22-12-2010, 07:09 PM

Hi Jason

I used to run the following:

IBM ThinkPad R40, XP pro SP3 with 512M RAM, Intel Centrino 1.4Ghz processor. System purchased in June 2002.

SBIG ST7 Parallel ccd camera, CCDSoft camera control.
The Sky 6 planetarium program
Orion Deep Space Start Shooter ccd camera (original model approx 6 or 7 years old).
GPUSB
PHD Guiding.

Occasionally I would loose comms with the mount when images were being downloaded from the ST7, which took approx 16 secs per frame.

Cheers

Dennis

tlgerdes (Trevor) · #4 22-12-2010, 09:34 PM

Regularly did this on my IBM/Lenovo X61 Laptop, as well as watching videos while it happens.

1x USB Orion Starshoot Autoguider, run by PHD
1x USB Canon 1000d, run by EOS Utility
1x Serial connector for Gemini run with GCC
1x Stellarium
1x Window Media Player.

All worked fine. Dont run the GCC and serial nowadays as I have gotten use to the Gemini handcontroller.

mithrandir (Andrew) · #5 22-12-2010, 10:13 PM

Are you talking about a laptop or a desktop/tower? I haven't seen a new laptop with parallel port advertised for ages. Your best chance for a working parallel interface on a laptop will be a PCMCIA or PCCard - whichever fits the laptop. There are some USB to parallel converters but I haven't heard anything good said about them except for connecting a printer.

I run PHD, Nebulosity, and any one of TheSky6/Stellarium/CdC/C2A with ASCOM drivers for the Gemini on a 1.6GHz Atom notebook with 2GB of RAM and XP.

Any newish desktop will have more grunt than you need, and a parallel port.

koputai (Jason) · #6 22-12-2010, 11:03 PM

Thanks guys.

You may laugh, but I'm going to see how far I get using a Celeron 700 desktop (e-Vectra), with 256mb RAM.
I've got a couple of these low power (~25 watts) machines lying around, and wouldn't mind having a headless
one connected to all the gear, so I can just remote desktop in to it.

I'll start by loading up and running one app at a time.

Cheers,
Jason.

supernova1965 (Warren) · #7 23-12-2010, 06:59 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by koputai

Thanks guys.

You may laugh, but I'm going to see how far I get using a Celeron 700 desktop (e-Vectra), with 256mb RAM.
I've got a couple of these low power (~25 watts) machines lying around, and wouldn't mind having a headless
one connected to all the gear, so I can just remote desktop in to it.

I'll start by loading up and running one app at a time.

Cheers,
Jason.

I am not laughing at you too much but I think you will struggle with that machine to do all that you want it too. I could be wrong but I don't think so

if you want to persist with that one you will need more ram probably with XP atleast 2gig with any OS higher than that you will need the max you can put in with the limit of 32bit will only use just over 3gig so anything above that is wasted.

koputai (Jason) · #8 23-12-2010, 09:52 AM

I'm running XP Pro, and the hardware is maxed out! These machines can take a maximum of 256Mb of RAM, and a 20 Gig HDD. I'll strip as much of the O/S out as I can.

I don't think it'll have any trouble running CCDOps (for the SBIG parallel camera). Will load up the autoguider first and see how we go.

Cheers,
Jason.

koputai (Jason) · #9 23-12-2010, 05:02 PM

Pretty much a no go on the autoguider. It runs, and takes pictures, but way too slow.

Stellarium next!

pmrid (Peter) · #10 23-12-2010, 05:15 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by koputai

Thanks guys.

You may laugh, but I'm going to see how far I get using a Celeron 700 desktop (e-Vectra), with 256mb RAM.

You're pushing your luck here. I have found that the most CPU-intensive application is usually the imaging software since it has to deal with fairly large files moving from the camera to the PC and being CPU hogs, they make other programs run erratically during times of peak usage. Added to that, the older machines are usually not equipped with much of a hard disk either in size or speed - because their BUS speed (matched with RAM speed) is usually pretty low. Added to that, remember that the Celeron CPUs are essentially Pentiums with the Maths co-processor disabled making them slow with anything graphic. You would have no trouble running your mount and a simple planetarium (a low graphics type like Cartes de Ciel preferably) and possibly even PHD as well, but use the other one to do nothing but run the camera. I would also max out the RAM on these machines to the most it will take.
Good luck but if you're anywhere near SE Qld, it'll be quite a while before you get to try it out.
Peter

Terry B · #11 23-12-2010, 07:08 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by koputai

Has anyone tried running two cameras plus their mount from one pc?

I want to run the following:

1x EQ6Pro (EQMOD)
1x Orion Starshoot Autoguider
1x SBIG Parallel camera

Before I go to the trouble of setting it all up, is it possible?

Cheers,
Jason.

I run almost exactly these off an old desktop PC in the observatory. It has about 700mb of ram and a 30g HD + an external HD.
My set up is an EQ6 running EQMOD via Skymap Pro 6, QHY guider, SBIG ST9E (parallel) or an ST10XME (USB).
All works perfectly well.
You don't need a powerful computer to run this stuff. The power is needed for processing images not taking them.

Bassnut (Fred) · #12 23-12-2010, 08:06 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Terry B

You don't need a powerful computer to run this stuff. The power is needed for processing images not taking them.

Exactly, dont worry about it, at all.

frolinmod · #13 30-12-2010, 10:25 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by mithrandir

I haven't seen a new laptop with parallel port advertised for ages. Your best chance for a working parallel interface on a laptop will be a PCMCIA or PCCard - whichever fits the laptop.

Currently selling Dell Latitude and Dell Precision Mobile Workstation laptops have docking station ports on their bottoms. I have the rather slim and simple legacy port dock that has a 9-pin serial port, a 25-pin parallel port, a PS2 keyboard port, a PS2 mouse port and two additional USB ports. The serial and parallel ports are real and are present in the BIOS setup even if you don't have the dock attached. In addition to the docking port, the Dell Latitude 6510 that I have here also has an ExpressCard/34 slot, a CardBus slot, and three internal MiniPCI Express slots. Pretty much everything except the proverbial kitchen sink. These are all rather handy.

(Disclaimer: I'm not associated with Dell in any way shape or form, nor do I condone their business practices.

)

higginsdj · #14 31-12-2010, 12:32 AM

My observatory PC is an old 1ghz Athlon, circa 2000, with 500mb ram. Its on its 4th power supply and still going strong with maxim, acp, vnc, focusmax et al running on auto all night long. Its connected to the mount via serial, 1 parallel and 1 usb ccd camera, a serial auto guider and a filterwheel.

Cheers