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Old 31-03-2009, 11:18 AM
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allan gould
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EQMOD, Astroplanner and Guidemaster

Ive been changing over my control of the HEQ5-Pro in collaboration with Peter Bester. This was an attempt to change some of my attitudes and to try out EQMOD with the synta system.
I had got fed up with the hand controller and the inaccuracies of the Synta pointing software so a new regime was installed. I purchased a TTL-232R FTDI USB to Serial (TTL level 5V) converter cable from Dontronics (http://www.dontronics-shop.com/) so that I could do away with the handcontroller and use one cable for EQMOD and autoguiding. I then bought a PC gamepad and set this up for remote controlling of the mount. No more cables here. Really accurate goto as claimed by EQMOD - now all objects on the chip of DSI 2 pro chip, which is quite small. Complete planning and control of scope and goto using Astroplanner and quick polar alignment using WCS. I was using PhD guiding for the pulseguide of the scope but I found it was sucking the brains out of my laptop when I had a few programs running. Also the guiding was a bit erratic so I switched to Guidemaster. What a difference, where I used to have some slight ovality to my stars on some frames, all of the guided shots with guidemaster were perfect stars and no guiding errors. The guiding was perfect.
Now I have an imaging setup that I can use in my backyard for small galaxies that defeats the BrisVegas light pollution and with very few cables running to the mount. Its more accurate at all levels and simpler to setup and tear down at night.
If you have an HEQ5 or EQ6 mount try EQMOD. I was reluctant but perservered and will never go back to the handpaddle control.
The shot of M61 was a quickie stack of 10x1min with the DSI 2 Pro
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  #2  
Old 31-03-2009, 11:41 AM
ozstockman (Mike)
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Location: Kenmore Hills, Brisbane, QLD
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I've got PHD(QHY5 pulse guiding), CDC, Eqmod and Nebulosity 2(QHY8) running through remote desktop and there is no problem with memory.
How much memory do you have?
I added extra 2 GB to my laptop(remote desktop client) making it total 4GB but mostly because I'm running it all on Windows Vista Business through remote desktop which takes a lot of resources. My desktop which is Remote Desktop server has Windows Vista Ultimate with 2GB only and it works also ok.

I guess you can still use Guidemaster with pulse guiding as it's ASCOM and EQMOD feature and not related to auto guiding software. Just try it and you won't notice any difference in auto guiding while there will be no need in a cable for guiding coming back from your PC to a ST4 port of your mount for guiding commands. I have a QHY5 for guiding and has not been using both ST4 ports(on camera and mount) for a long time.
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Old 31-03-2009, 11:46 AM
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allan gould
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Ive got 2 Gb memory. It doesn't seem to be memory but processor related. You dont need a guiding cable with Guidemaster either as the pulseguiding is the same as PhDguiding. Also you get far better feedback on how the guiding is performing in Guidemaster than PhDguiding. Guidemaster also has a polar alignment routine which I will check out as it may be the same or better that WCS for aligning the mount (and its free).
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Old 31-03-2009, 12:40 PM
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Terry B
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I also use guidemaster rather than PHD. It certainly gives better feedback about tracking and is easier to change the parameters. I also like not having to redo the callibration after it has been turned off. It does require that you work out whick way is E/W etc before you start but I have a permanent set up so never move the quider to upset this.
The other reason I prefer guidemaster is that I seem to get more crashes and freezing of the program with PHD. I use a QHY5 guider and if I hook the cable or accidentally unplug it PHD freezes but guidemaster doen't.
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Old 03-04-2009, 09:35 PM
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RobF (Rob)
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Cheers guys. I've been having fun doing my EQMOD apprenticeship too. Must have a serious go at Guidemaster though from what has been said.

Any excuse to do some more computer/software fiddling!....
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