ST4 stay...or should it go????

Hi all,

I haven't posted here in a while. The weather has been very poor here in CT. Consequently, I have not been able to try my new 20D since upgrading from the 300D.

Which leads me to the question :S My ST4/ Tau (Ceti)? combo has doing nothing. I am thinking of posting if for sale and using Guide Dog and my TouCam Pro for guiding OR maybe purchasing a used 201 guider 8O .

Any thoughts?

Thanks for your input,

Tom, good to see you!
Question, anything wrong with the ST4? why not use it for autoguiding, since you already have it? is it too difficult to use?


Clear skies to you, and keep in touch! 8)

Hi Tom,

The main issue with the ToUcam for autoguiding is whether you can pick up bright enough stars to autoguide on.

I think ideally the ToUcam needs the Steve Chambers long exposure mod to be useful as an autoguider as I could only get guide stars near Orion and nowhere else practically. Mind you I since realised I may have had the frames per second set too high. I have heard others say they got guide stars no trouble but that is not my expereince. I suppose also that would be a function of which OTA you used as the guide scope. An 8 inch SCT may be good for guiding and piggy back an 80mm refractor.

Another choice is the Atik 1HS or 1C as they already have the mod and they double as an excellent planetary cam.

Greg.

I was using an ST-237 as an autoguider. It is an excellent autoguider. The problem is it takes a few minutes to boot up the computer and then it takes a while to do the calibration due to the long download times. I now use an ST-4. Since there is no laptop, the downloads are instant. So calibration goes pretty fast and it frees up my laptop for other stuff like DSLR focus or The Sky or for using by SBIG camera. By the time the laptop boots up, I already have the ST-4 calibrated and it's ready to go. Once I get my 10D focused with the laptop, I can have the ST-4 autoguiding and I can put up my laptop back inside the house early. That makes one less thing I have to drag back inside the house at 2:00 AM. The only way I would get rid of my ST-4, is if I get an STV.
Ralph