Dear Jasem, Dear all,
June 13, 2021 was another great night for imaging. I took the opportunity to try to collect as much info as possible on my first GOTO. As a reminder, I NEVER have a problem in winter. The problem has only appeared since we switched to daylight saving time. It's hard to believe that it's a coincidence.
As it is, I can do a Plate Solver before each session and then my problem is solved. But I think that in my configuration (everything runs on the PI4 under Stellarmate - AZEQ6 with EQMod and GPSD), there is something that positions the first GOTO wrong.
Thank you for your help
Best regards
Christian
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Dear Jasem, I have taken the time to detail the June 10, 2021 session minute by minute. My goal was to document the problem in connection with the FITS and Calibrate window. But nothing went as planned. Before leaving, I had updated my StellarMate. The system updated 28 components. From then on, preparing flats with Calibrate was not a problem. Switching the display in the FIT window from "Histogram" to "Statistics" which was crashing Kstar works perfectly (Grrr! I hate these bugs which are not reproducible). After the update, I even noticed that Calibrate saved the settings, which was not the case before. For this problem, the case is solved. Thank you. However, what has always been a problem has become a major obstacle. After the update, my QHYCCD cameras were no longer recognized by EKOS. I had to make some changes in the physical wiring. So I moved the cameras from the USB3 HUB to USB2 HUB. But I was not able to test the QHYCCD5III178C while guiding. It is when I arrived on site that I discovered the problem. Everything went perfectly until 23:05 (page 17 of the PDF). There I connected the QHY5III178C guidance camera.As a reminder, the internal guidance of SM never went below +/- 8". So, I switched to PHD2. If the two cameras QHY294M and QHY5III178C are connected when EKOS starts, EKOS identifies and initializes them. But when I start PHD2, it connects the EQMod mount and the guidance camera. But at the first loop, PHD2 doesn't answer anymore. Pressing stop has no effect. It is necessary to kill PHD2 to take again the hand. Obviously, the guidance doesn't work. On the other hand, if I start EKOS without connecting the QHY5III178C guidance camera, EKOS only sees the QHY294M. Once EKOS has started, I connect the QHY5III178C and launch PHD2. PHD2 initializes the camera and the guidance starts normally. If I ask for a stop on PHD2, the camera stops the looping function and I take over.Except that on 10.06.2021 at 23:05, PHD2 did not see my camera. I made many unsuccessful attempts until 00:53 when I tried to move the QHY5III178C from the USB2 Hub to the USB3 Hub. After that, PHD2 obviously found the guiding camera and I was able to image without a problem.The fact remains that EKOS obviously confuses QHY294M and QHY5III178C when both cameras are present at startup. I tried to document my entire sequence. Obviously, I have log files which are relatively large. But here is in the attached file a systematic flow of the session of June 10, 2021. I know that this problem exists since I created my setup with QHY294M, PoleMaster and QHY5III178C. But it's complicated to show. So, I hope this will help to understand what is going on. Thank you for your helpSincerelyChristian
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Dear Jasem, I have taken the time to detail the June 10, 2021 session minute by minute. My goal was to document the problem in connection with the FITS and Calibrate window. But nothing went as planned. Before leaving, I had updated my StellarMate. The system updated 28 components. From then on, preparing flats with Calibrate was not a problem. Switching the display in the FIT window from "Histogram" to "Statistics" which was crashing Kstar works perfectly (Grrr! I hate these bugs which are not reproducible). After the update, I even noticed that Calibrate saved the settings, which was not the case before. For this problem, the case is solved. Thank you.Best regardsCVO
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Dear Jasem,
It's difficult to put all informations in the windows. I created a PDF file which contains all the information.
Thank you for your help
Best regards
Christian
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It does indeed compensate for two hours, but how does it know that it is 1 hour of time difference and 1 hour of summer time and not two hours of time difference? Because there, it is as if the frame takes into account two time zones. It's strange because it also has a GPS position. It would be "easy" to calculate the current position on this basis.
This problem is clearly absent in winter. So it's really related to its understanding of daylight saving time.
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In Switzerland, we follow the European Community and we add one hour in summer. Then, I have +1h from UTC in winter and +2h from UTC in summer. But, like
rbarberac
said, I didnt' find an box to tick in EKOS to distinguish "summer time" vs "winter time". Then, it works as if I'm living in a place which is +2h from UK. May be the right think to do is the systematic use of plate solving at the begining of the session, like proposed by rbarberac?
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Hello Jasem,
Thank you for your super-fast answer. I will try asap and I will reply.
Best regards
Christian
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Hello,I use a PI4 with Stellarmate, an AZEQ6 mount, a QHY294M camera for imaging, a QHYFW3 filter wheel connected directly to the camera, a QHY5III178C camera for guiding, a focuser all controlled on VNC with PC DELL on Windows 10. I control the mount, the focuser, the GPSD and the QHY294M camera directly from Kstars which runs on the Stellarmate and the PI4. So I use EKOS and INDI drivers.For the guidance, I had problems with the internal guidance of EKOS. I use PHD2 which runs on the PI4 and is called by EKOS as external guider. Finally, for the PolarMaster camera that was conflicting with EKOS, I finally run the software directly from Windows 10.
I guide with a QHY5III178C camera. When I prepare my setup in EKOS, if I put two QHYCCD cameras, it recognizes the QHY294M and the QHY5III178C. But when I launch PHD2, it sees the QHY5III178C but crashes after the 1st capture... I never get my hand back if I ask for a stop and I have to kill the PHD2 process in progress. If I do all the same but I don't declare the QHY5III178C in EKOS or I explicitly disconnect it from INDI, then PHD2 recognizes it and drives it correctly. But in this case, I don't have to connect the QHY5III178C when I connect EKOS, because it looks for the first available camera and it finds the QHY5III178C first and never offers the QHY294M again. So, the only way is to put both in EKOS and then disconnect the QHY5III178C manually from INDI before launching PHD2 or not to connect the USB cable of the QHY5III178C, launch EKOS with only the QHY294M and then once EKOS is not looking for a camera, connect the QHY5III178C and launch PHD2.
Obviously, it works by tinkering like that, but it reminds me of my beginnings in computing at the end of the 70's... If it works, touch it more! We are far from plug-and-play 
. Than
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Hello,I use a PI4 with Stellarmate, an AZEQ6 mount, a QHY294M camera for imaging, a QHYFW3 filter wheel connected directly to the camera, a QHY5III178C camera for guiding, a focuser all controlled on VNC with PC DELL on Windows 10. I control the mount, the focuser, the GPSD and the QHY294M camera directly from Kstars which runs on the Stellarmate and the PI4. So I use EKOS and INDI drivers.For the guidance, I had problems with the internal guidance of EKOS. I use PHD2 which runs on the PI4 and is called by EKOS as external guider. Finally, for the PolarMaster camera that was conflicting with EKOS, I finally run the software directly from Windows 10. While during the winter I had no problems, the switch to daylight saving time created a problem that I can't seem to solve. In winter, my PI4 did not keep time. But the mount was using the GPSD signal to set the current time. I had chosen in Kstar that "GPSD sets the time for all devices". When the time changed to daylight saving time, the GOTO did not work anymore. We were off target every time. So I bought a Hat RCT for my PI4. It works. My PI4-SM is now on local time. So when I say "Kstar sets the time for all devices", it works. But if I ask for the time to be set by GPSD, then the GOTO falls an hour behind the target. My assumption is that GPSD does transmit that I am in UTC+2 but not that I am in daylight saving time. However, everything seems to be correct. I was able to verify my bad positioning by doing an ALIGN after the Meridian flip (see file ekos-2021-05-30T22-32-40 TXT then ekos-2021-05-31T00-32-57 TXT). Thank you for your help.Sincerely
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Hello,I use a PI4 with Stellarmate, an AZEQ6 mount, a QHY294M camera for imaging, a QHYFW3 filter wheel connected directly to the camera, a QHY5III178C camera for guiding, a focuser, all controlled on VNC with PC DELL on Windows 10. I control the mount, the focuser, the GPSD and the QHY294M camera directly from Kstars which runs on the Stellarmate and the PI4. So I use EKOS and INDI drivers.For the guidance, I had problems with the internal guidance of EKOS. I use PHD2 which runs on the PI4 and is called by EKOS as external guider. Finally, for the PolarMaster camera that was conflicting with EKOS, I finally run the software directly from Windows 10. First, my new TS 130mm telescope requires me to do flats every session. So I use the Calibrate function on EKOS on the SM. Everything works. I analyze my flats by looking at the statistics in the FITS window. When after looking at the statistics, I switch to FITS in histogram mode, Kstars crashes. I have to restart Kstars and EKOS. The QHY294M camera is no longer functional. I have to unplug the USB port of the camera, restart Kstar, EKOS, reset the driver of the camera and re-set all the information of the QHY294M camera (name of the light files, gain, offset, filter, etc.) in EKOS. Not normal, isn't it? Thanks for your help.
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Results of the weekend tests
During this weekend, I made two tries. First, I installed an August 2020 version of AstroPIBox. Everything worked perfectly. Both cameras (PoleMaster and QHY5III178c) were recognized. Then, I reflashed an old version of StellarMate (1.5.4). Everything worked for both cameras (I have not yet tested the 294M since the drivers still seem to change a lot), both in Kstars-EKOS and in PolarMaster. I ran the command "sudo apt-get update && sudo apt-get -y dist-upgrade" and everything updated. I chose "Y" as SM installation option. At the end of the update, I reboot everything. Kstars-EKOS and PoleMaster see both cameras and collect images. That's it. Here I am. But at least, I'll be able to get out again... Hopefully the 294M will work with this setting.
Thank you for your collaboration
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Thank you for your comment. QHYCCD said me that they will give me a call after making some tests. I will publish any useful answers.
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