Asiair and Avalon mount (Stargo)?
a month later
mixomatos wrote:effectively i can connect my M-zero mount, but the tracking rate seems to be wrong...
Okay, could you please tell us more details?
8 months later
Currently I use a Skywatcher mount with my ASiair pro, ASI2600mc-p, ASI120mm-mini connected with an Eq-Mod cable with no issues and great success...However I'm investigating purchasing an Avalon M-Zero OBS mount. Have ALL of the connection and control issues between the ASIair Pro and Avalon mounts been addressed and solved? I would like to set up in a remote location and need to verify reliability. Thank you!
ChrisMontemayor Solved
7 months later
- Edited
My Aavlon+ASIAIR Pro combo does not work very well:
I have an ASIAIR Pro (FW 1.7) and the new Avalon StarGo Pro 2 (Raspberry Pi 4 based, FW 1.3) controlling an Avalon M-uno mount. I am using an iPad Pro, iOS 14.8. The AAP and the SG2 are in the same local WiFi network. I can access the SG2 and slew the telescope from the iPad using SkySafari using Meade LX200 Classic. Works well.
In the ASIAIR app, however, I cannot connect the SG2 when using LX200 Classic or Avalon StarGo. I can connect using LX200 Basic, but then there is no slewing, no GoTo and no plate solving possible. I only see the coordinates of the mount but no controls.
The little movement/control arrows etc for the mount do not show in the app. Settings are: fixed IP address of the SG2, port# 9624 (standard INDI port), and TCP.
Any other suggestions? Any help would be highly appreciated.
5 months later
I have an Avalon M-Uno mount and I am using the ASIAIR Pro to drive my guiding with ZWO cameras for guiding and imaging. For the Avalon mount I use the StarGo software selection. However I cannot find anyway to adjust the guide rate (sidereal rate multiplier). Is this not an option with the StarGo interface?
- Edited
Hi. Thank you for your feedback.
For your parameter settings, go to the AVALON forum on the AVALON homepage.
The StarGO2 controller is a Raspberry Pi4 computer with INDI or ASCOM based drivers and controllers. Completely different to the classical StarGO interface and software.
Since the SG2 is INDI-based, I can adjust any parameter in the native SG2 INDI driver via EKOS or iINDI. The actual problem is, that both the ASIAIR and the SG2 are INDI severs. The ASIAIR software does not seem to be able to communicate with a second INDI server, while it is expecting an INDI client. This would be possible when using so called chained INDI servers. ZWO and ASIAIR do not support this configuration.
The only INDI driver that seems to be working in this configuration is the LX200 BASIC driver on the ASIAIR. This driver does not seem to provide/include guiding or slewing commands. Therefore, guiding is not possible.
I have been successfully using PHD2 from another computer for guiding. PHD2 accepts remote INDI servers.
If ZWO would accept and allow chained INDI servers, they would potentially “loose” their proprietary support of only ASI-based hardware. Because another INDI server could allow any hardware. This is a support nightmare for ZWO, obviously. I think, however, ZWO should make exceptions for remote INDI-based mount controllers. There are not many out there, so it is probably not on top of their to-do list.
Another update:
The planning mode, re-centering with the green Go-button and plate solving is working now between the StarGO2 and the ASIAIR Pro. This is great for imaging sessions.
Interactive slewing and guiding is still not working due to the limitations of the LX200 Basic driver.
I am still puzzled why, because the LX200 Classic driver works with SkySafari but not with the ASIAIR.
The ASIAir only uses indi for telescope control, nothing else as far as I can tell, all other ZWO supported hardware is hardwired into the imager and guidier executables.
You can connect kstar/Ekos (and Stellarium on desktop) to the indiserver running on the Air, I do this all the time. You can use the Ekos indi settings dialogs to look at and change settings but this might confuse the app running on your phone.
Interesting. Thank you! I tried that without success. Is there a tutorial?
”My” EKOS could not find the ASIAIR with the IP:7264 port address. How did you connect the two!
- Edited
You need to be in station mode (connected to your lan), then if you have dyndns you can use the hostname asiair, or else use the IP address.
You need to define a camera for Ekos to allow you to connect but it doesn't matter what it is.
- Edited
For Stellarium - forgive the transparent windows, I don't know what widgets it uses but they are pretty awful.
Cool! Thank you! Will try it later! With the IP address as the remote server it did not work.
The ASIAIR and the SG2 are both attached with Ethernet cables to one of my WiFi mesh satellites. This provides a very stable and fast connection to both.
a year later