Three points: 1) With the mini-PC option, you also need to factor in the cost of a power distribution box; this is part of the feature set of the ASI Air and the Eagle, but generally not a mini-computer. 2) When buying a new computer I always buy more processing power and disk space than I currently need because in a year or so whatever software I am using will require it. This extends the usable life of the device and ends up saving money in the long run. The Eagle XTM is, as you said, over the top, but I went with the Eagle 5 Pro over the regular Eagle 5 for just this reason. For processing, I bought a "gaming laptop," even though I'm not much of a gamer, because computers marketed to gamers provide a lot of processing power for a relatively low price. Computers marketed for businesses and "professionals" tend to priced more steeply for the same capability because businesses can afford to pay more. I bought a top-of-the-line gaming laptop and a large, high-quality monitor, and it runs PixInsight very quickly. 3) When buying a computer for processing, make sure it has an NVIDIA graphics chip. Some of the processing steps are significantly faster with an NVIDIA GPU. (Disclosure: I used to work for NVIDIA, but I no longer have any affiliation with the company. I wish I still owned my stock though; I'd be able to retire right now.)
Very good and valid points, Dave! I also went with the Eagle Pro exactly out of that reason! And yes, buying a gaming notebook with the official reason to have enough processing power to afterwards unofficially still using it for gaming is a very good strategy.... 😁
If you have old gear - like in an Astrolab - you might need 2-4 serial ports (or a high quality serial to USB converter) - you can still get Serial port cards for i5 and i7 class PCs. With ZWO some of their devices need high quality, thick USB 3 cables - and I have found they ship many with thin, low quality ribbon USB cables that cause lots of dropped frames issues. If you need to go over 2 metres in cable length from a camera - use a 2 metre cable into a POWERED USB3.1 high quality hub and connect this hub by a 3m USB cable of high quality into your PC. When it comes to stacking and image processing - a very big rig PC helps - lots of cores and NVidia video card and 64 - 128 GB of RAM! I have seriously considered just spinning up and renting for an hour or two a 100 CPU VM on the Amazon cloud to run PixInsight's WBPP script - all it means is you have to upload up to 1,000 images of 30 - 50 MB each... Great video!
Just to add another option similar to the ASI Air, I run the free Astroberry installation on a Raspberry Pi 4 mounted on my 8" Ritchie Chretien 'scope. Whilst Astroberry suits my needs completely it is not that popular so the there is not much in the way of regular updates to it, if at all. For me it controls my HEQ5 mount, my ASI294MC Pro camera, my ASI178 off axis guide camera and connects to my GPS dongle. I connect to it with my iPad or a Windows laptop using VNC remote desktop while I am out at my dark site. I need the Windows laptop when I am setting up to polar align using a Polemaster camera which is Windows only. I don't have a filter wheel or motorised focusser. If I had the cash to spare I'd love an Eagle 5 but cannot possibly justify it considering how well Astroberry works for me and considering that any astrophotography kit will spend most of its life sitting in a cupboard given the weather here in the UK.
HI Sasha! Thanks for your videos, I enjoy them a lot! Regarding computers, you may want to add to your list the RBFocus Gaius-S2, a 3-in-1 system. It is a mini computer with a range of RAM options serving an Intel Celeron N5105 processor with 4 cores at 2.90GHz. Additionally it has 6 USB ports and 7 power outputs to connect up to 5 devices and 2 dew heaters with a power management software. It also has improved connectivity by incorporating a next-generation WiFi 6 card and a dual-band antenna. All in a 250 g case!
@@viewintospace definitely worth exploring the items they sell (only Gaius, focuser - which is absolutely fantastic! much better that ZWO, rotator and flat pannel), particularly if you live in Europe.
@@ritacastil Heard in the mean time some horror stories about them - bad quality, very uncooperative customer service…. So I heard now both sides - all I can say is interesting but I would definitely have to look deeper into it. Also suspicious that they are not better known if their products are so good….
I started my astrophotography experience years ago with ASI air. After a while I thought it would be fun to use Nina. I found the necessity to use many support applications / drivers and generally dealing with windows a big pain in the ass. And Nina was overkill for my needs. So I went back to ASI air since I believe in keeping things as simple as possible. By the way you are incorrect in saying ASI air can't be run from a computer. In the most recent version I am able to install its app on my Mac studio and control it from there. After exploring the PC alternative I am convinced that ASI air does all I need and more in a much more user-friendly way. I really enjoy your tutorials.
I fully agree - for a lot of people the ASIAir is the easier and sufficient solution and they are happy with the products ZWO offers. I just feel is important that people know, what the consequences are when buying an ASIAir, but if that is considered and they are ok with it, then perfectly fine!
Hello Sasha Thanks for the video. I am using the same screen as you for post processing but I am really struggling to get good color matches between what I see on the screen and what appears when I upload on astrobin or facebook. What presets are you using ? Internet & Web (sRGB) ? Thanks Damien
I use the default P3-600nits profile and never had any issues. Obviously, FB and Insta compress your pic to death, that is normal and has nothing to do with your screen, but with Astrobin it should look fine. If you own an iPad and iPhone check if a pic you sync through the regular photo app looks the same on screen and iPad/Phone. If not, that would indicate something is wrong and it might make sense to calibrate your display.
@@viewintospace That's what I used initially, and the results were horrible on the iPhone, iPad, FB and astrobin. I did calibrate the screen with a spider, and it just made things even worse. The least bad solution I have found currently is to use sRGB on the Studio display and correct the image on the iPad before uploading it.
@@damiengalanaud3817 Sounds to me your screen has an issue….. I would set it back to factory settings and then a pic on your ipad should look very similar than the one on your studio display. If not, you might make a visit to the Apple shop….
Clear and concise as with the ither videos.
Three points:
1) With the mini-PC option, you also need to factor in the cost of a power distribution box; this is part of the feature set of the ASI Air and the Eagle, but generally not a mini-computer.
2) When buying a new computer I always buy more processing power and disk space than I currently need because in a year or so whatever software I am using will require it. This extends the usable life of the device and ends up saving money in the long run. The Eagle XTM is, as you said, over the top, but I went with the Eagle 5 Pro over the regular Eagle 5 for just this reason. For processing, I bought a "gaming laptop," even though I'm not much of a gamer, because computers marketed to gamers provide a lot of processing power for a relatively low price. Computers marketed for businesses and "professionals" tend to priced more steeply for the same capability because businesses can afford to pay more. I bought a top-of-the-line gaming laptop and a large, high-quality monitor, and it runs PixInsight very quickly.
3) When buying a computer for processing, make sure it has an NVIDIA graphics chip. Some of the processing steps are significantly faster with an NVIDIA GPU. (Disclosure: I used to work for NVIDIA, but I no longer have any affiliation with the company. I wish I still owned my stock though; I'd be able to retire right now.)
Very good and valid points, Dave! I also went with the Eagle Pro exactly out of that reason! And yes, buying a gaming notebook with the official reason to have enough processing power to afterwards unofficially still using it for gaming is a very good strategy.... 😁
If you have old gear - like in an Astrolab - you might need 2-4 serial ports (or a high quality serial to USB converter) - you can still get Serial port cards for i5 and i7 class PCs.
With ZWO some of their devices need high quality, thick USB 3 cables - and I have found they ship many with thin, low quality ribbon USB cables that cause lots of dropped frames issues. If you need to go over 2 metres in cable length from a camera - use a 2 metre cable into a POWERED USB3.1 high quality hub and connect this hub by a 3m USB cable of high quality into your PC.
When it comes to stacking and image processing - a very big rig PC helps - lots of cores and NVidia video card and 64 - 128 GB of RAM! I have seriously considered just spinning up and renting for an hour or two a 100 CPU VM on the Amazon cloud to run PixInsight's WBPP script - all it means is you have to upload up to 1,000 images of 30 - 50 MB each...
Great video!
I’m so glad I found this! Thank you! Well done sir
Stellarmate Pro is worth a mention
Love your channel. Keep up the great work 🤩
Just to add another option similar to the ASI Air, I run the free Astroberry installation on a Raspberry Pi 4 mounted on my 8" Ritchie Chretien 'scope. Whilst Astroberry suits my needs completely it is not that popular so the there is not much in the way of regular updates to it, if at all. For me it controls my HEQ5 mount, my ASI294MC Pro camera, my ASI178 off axis guide camera and connects to my GPS dongle. I connect to it with my iPad or a Windows laptop using VNC remote desktop while I am out at my dark site. I need the Windows laptop when I am setting up to polar align using a Polemaster camera which is Windows only. I don't have a filter wheel or motorised focusser. If I had the cash to spare I'd love an Eagle 5 but cannot possibly justify it considering how well Astroberry works for me and considering that any astrophotography kit will spend most of its life sitting in a cupboard given the weather here in the UK.
HI Sasha! Thanks for your videos, I enjoy them a lot! Regarding computers, you may want to add to your list the RBFocus Gaius-S2, a 3-in-1 system. It is a mini computer with a range of RAM options serving an Intel Celeron N5105 processor with 4 cores at 2.90GHz. Additionally it has 6 USB ports and 7 power outputs to connect up to 5 devices and 2 dew heaters with a power management software. It also has improved connectivity by incorporating a next-generation WiFi 6 card and a dual-band antenna. All in a 250 g case!
Cool stuff- never heard of them before but looks great - thanks for the tip!
@@viewintospace definitely worth exploring the items they sell (only Gaius, focuser - which is absolutely fantastic! much better that ZWO, rotator and flat pannel), particularly if you live in Europe.
@@ritacastil Heard in the mean time some horror stories about them - bad quality, very uncooperative customer service…. So I heard now both sides - all I can say is interesting but I would definitely have to look deeper into it. Also suspicious that they are not better known if their products are so good….
I started my astrophotography experience years ago with ASI air. After a while I thought it would be fun to use Nina. I found the necessity to use many support applications / drivers and generally dealing with windows a big pain in the ass. And Nina was overkill for my needs. So I went back to ASI air since I believe in keeping things as simple as possible. By the way you are incorrect in saying ASI air can't be run from a computer. In the most recent version I am able to install its app on my Mac studio and control it from there. After exploring the PC alternative I am convinced that ASI air does all I need and more in a much more user-friendly way. I really enjoy your tutorials.
I fully agree - for a lot of people the ASIAir is the easier and sufficient solution and they are happy with the products ZWO offers. I just feel is important that people know, what the consequences are when buying an ASIAir, but if that is considered and they are ok with it, then perfectly fine!
Hello Sasha
Thanks for the video. I am using the same screen as you for post processing but I am really struggling to get good color matches between what I see on the screen and what appears when I upload on astrobin or facebook. What presets are you using ? Internet & Web (sRGB) ?
Thanks
Damien
I use the default P3-600nits profile and never had any issues. Obviously, FB and Insta compress your pic to death, that is normal and has nothing to do with your screen, but with Astrobin it should look fine. If you own an iPad and iPhone check if a pic you sync through the regular photo app looks the same on screen and iPad/Phone. If not, that would indicate something is wrong and it might make sense to calibrate your display.
@@viewintospace That's what I used initially, and the results were horrible on the iPhone, iPad, FB and astrobin. I did calibrate the screen with a spider, and it just made things even worse. The least bad solution I have found currently is to use sRGB on the Studio display and correct the image on the iPad before uploading it.
@@damiengalanaud3817 Sounds to me your screen has an issue….. I would set it back to factory settings and then a pic on your ipad should look very similar than the one on your studio display. If not, you might make a visit to the Apple shop….
@@viewintospace Tanks ! Will try it