Best Connection for Astroart to Gemini 2

[michael_savo]

Hi Everyone,
I am looking for a little help. I presently have a Losmandy G11 with Gemini 1. Based on reviewing many of the posts, I am clearly underutilizing the capabilities of Astroart. Presently I connect my Lodestar autoguider input into the G1 autoguider port and just use the guide camera relays to control the telescope. I pretty much just use the Gemini modeling and hand controller to slew to an object. it works well but I always get an error that says "Telescope is not moving or its speed is less than 0.5 pixel/second. Please check connection and try again". Despite the error it does seem to guide the scope pretty well but it will not function properly if I use the autocalibration settings. All that aside, I am finally upgrading to Gemini 2 - maybe I should wait a bit longer - it will be Gemini 3 soon!

My question is - what is the best connection for Astroart to control the Gemini2? USB? Not sure but I have read that even an ethernet connection can be used. I am thinking that I could be getting much more out of Astroart and perhaps a bit better guiding as well with a better connection. It will be a while before the mount gets sent back for upgrade, I am just trying to get prepared for when it all does come together. I also want be able to use Pempro on the upgraded mount - if for nothing else to baseline it and I am thinking the connection should be different for that to work as well.

Hopefully that all makes sense. I look forward to hearing from you.

Thanks.

Mike

[Iver]

FYI the auto calibration in AA8 works very well, much better then previous versions. Sorry I can't help with your Gemini 2 question.

[Dunmunro]

Hi Everyone,
I am looking for a little help. I presently have a Losmandy G11 with Gemini 1. Based on reviewing many of the posts, I am clearly underutilizing the capabilities of Astroart. Presently I connect my Lodestar autoguider input into the G1 autoguider port and just use the guide camera relays to control the telescope. I pretty much just use the Gemini modeling and hand controller to slew to an object. it works well but I always get an error that says "Telescope is not moving or its speed is less than 0.5 pixel/second. Please check connection and try again". Despite the error it does seem to guide the scope pretty well but it will not function properly if I use the autocalibration settings. All that aside, I am finally upgrading to Gemini 2 - maybe I should wait a bit longer - it will be Gemini 3 soon!

My question is - what is the best connection for Astroart to control the Gemini2? USB? Not sure but I have read that even an ethernet connection can be used. I am thinking that I could be getting much more out of Astroart and perhaps a bit better guiding as well with a better connection. It will be a while before the mount gets sent back for upgrade, I am just trying to get prepared for when it all does come together. I also want be able to use Pempro on the upgraded mount - if for nothing else to baseline it and I am thinking the connection should be different for that to work as well.

Hopefully that all makes sense. I look forward to hearing from you.

Thanks.

Mike

IIRC, you will have to use the ASCOM interface if you use USB for autoguider control. If you use ASCOM you can fully automate the mount and camera control and use the plate solve assisted centring which is extremely accurate and a huge time saver.

[michael_savo]

Thanks Iver. Thanks Dunmunro. I was going to upgrade to AA8 this weekend. I have read about the plate solving and centering and I have downloaded the ASCOM driver. I will eventually go that way but just a follow up question. If I continue to just use the Lodestar autoguider relays to control the scope, that should work correctly right? I would like the warm up to the new Gemini 2 first and then start expanding capabilities in AA8. Too many changes at once seldom work out for me! Thanks.

Mike

[Dunmunro]

Thanks Iver. Thanks Dunmunro. I was going to upgrade to AA8 this weekend. I have read about the plate solving and centering and I have downloaded the ASCOM driver. I will eventually go that way but just a follow up question. If I continue to just use the Lodestar autoguider relays to control the scope, that should work correctly right? I would like the warm up to the new Gemini 2 first and then start expanding capabilities in AA8. Too many changes at once seldom work out for me! Thanks.

Mike

Yes, the on camera relays should work as per usual.