MaximDL

[bazaud (Barry)]

Thanks Guys,

Looks like I need to try them all and a few hammers too.

Barry

Not trying the nails in the head thing.

[RickS (Rick)]

Barry,

It does come down to personal preference to a large extent and possibly first impressions too. I installed Maxim to try it and it took me very little effort to get up and running. If I'd struggled with it then I might have developed a different impression.

If you're the sort of person that doesn't like to tweak things it probably won't suit you. If you do like having control over all the knobs and levers then you're more likely to enjoy using it.

What you expect to do in future also has some relevance. If you want to use third party automation software or write your own scripts one day then Maxim is probably the only choice.

Cheers,
Rick.

[troypiggo (Troy)]

G'day. I'm in the same boat as Rick, in that I use MaxIm for image capture only, and use PixInsight for all of my processing. When I bought MaxIm, that was before I had PI, and I was using MaxIm for calibration and some processing. Found that PI beats it for all aspects of processing, from calibration and stacking to the final stages.

I'm sticking with MaxIm for image capture, for now, because I have invested the money in it. However, I have played with Sequence Generator Pro, and if I had my time again, I would have bought both SGP and PI, for less money than MaxIm alone by the way, and would be able to do everything MaxIm does and much more.

MaxIm does have a lot of 3rd party automation software available. However, SGP has it built-in. There isn't much else you'd need for image capture. For around $100, it's the best bang-for-buck image capture and automation software around. Download a free trial and see for yourself.

[Octane (Humayun)]

MaximDL has an excellent help menu with tutorials.

H

[Bassnut (Fred)]

Originally Posted by peter_4059

Give sequence generator pro a try. $100 and has very good functionality. The guys developing it are adding new features weekly and it has come a long way since they started.

I downloaded it, and it does look impressive. But "does more than DL" is a bit of a stretch. I don't see SBIG internal guide or AO, integration with focus max, auto dark library selection, direct support for PME /X, guide cam control other than an interface to 3 external (and fairly limited) guide applications and a few other things.

If you have the gear that just suits SGP and don't want to muck around to much and just take pics, it's a cracker I must say, but you wouldn't want bang large nails with it

[peter_4059 (Peter)]

The guys developing Sequence Generator Pro have chosen to integrate it with phd guiding. When it started they were using Nebulosity as the imaging interface however it now has it's own in-built imaging interface so it wouldn't surprise me to see it get it's own guiding functionality at some stage.

It doesn't interface with focusmax but has its own autofocus routine that does a pretty good job from what I've seen. It has platesolving with either Elbrus (free) or Pinpoint.

I agree with you if you need specific things like AO support then Maxim is going to be the way to go at this stage. AO is getting more affordable these days and will probably become more common as part of the average users kit so who knows in a years time - SGP is gaining functionality at an amazing rate.

Peter

[stevous67 (Steve M)]

Blah blah blah... No one asked what equipment he has? Or did I miss that?

Just pick something... "... my BBQ has 6 burners", "well mine has 7...".

Oh boy.