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SkySafari 5 Pro + SkyFi 3 + Orion Atlas Pro AZ/EQ-G = Inaccurate GoTo's (Answer: Synta Released New Firmware, And SkySafari 6 Pro Has Been Updated For Compatibility)

rpccss

August 08, 2018 15:29

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I’m using SkyFi 3 with SSF 5 Pro with my iPhone 6 with my new Atlas Pro Alt Az.  The mounts go to’s are very accurate using the HC, but as soon as I connect the SkiFi and use the SSF, the go to’s become very inaccurate meaning objects are barely in the field of view or completely out of it.  

For example 2 nights ago I was observing in Alt Az mode using the hand controller.  I slewed to about 15 different object in about an hour.  Extremely accurate. Upon hooking up the SF and SSF, the object which was perfectly centered in the EP was off center on the target cross hair target on the SSF 5 Pro screen.  I slewed to a number of objects and even after using ‘align to object xxx’ the objects were all poorly centered or out of the EP.  Then I disconnected it and went back to the mount's HC.   The accuracy became excellent again by just using the HC go to’s.  

I use SSF 5 Pro with my Evolution mount and there's none of this problem of inaccurate go to's, so I'm thinking its a problem with this mount and SSF.

Any ideas?

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16 comments

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  Bill Tschumy August 08, 2018 16:51

  We are not aware of any issues with the Atlas Pro and GoTo accuracy.  I assume this problem happens before you ever did an Align from within SkySafari?  Can you estimate how far off the GoTo's are (how many arcminutes)?

  I also assume you are connecting through the bottom of the hand controller?  What is the firmware version in the hand controller?

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  rpccss August 08, 2018 20:39

  Hi Bill,

  I have noticed this issue during about 3 different nights with this new mount.   I had just uploaded the latest firmware to make sure it wasn't b/c of that, to 04.39.05.  So I went out the other night specifically to 'test' the mount in AZ with SkyFi and SSF5Pro and the new firmware.   So, I did a 2 star alignment using the HC first, using Orion's suggested separations in the manual .   I verified that the go to's were very accurate with a number of objects first, taking about an hour.   Then I plugged SkyFi  into the bottom of the HC and connected.   The object, I think it was Jupiter, came up and even though Jupiter was in the dead center of the EP, it showed it to be on the circle of the circle and cross hairs (sorry, don't know what to call it).  I then 'aligned' and chose another target.  I was barely in the EP's FOV.  (20mm, 70* on a f/10 2032 f/l SCT.   I also notice that sometimes, the cross hairs aren't dead center on the object, especially when I zoom in using the + on the bottom right of the screen.

  Regards

  Bob

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  rpccss August 10, 2018 14:03

  Was out again last night with the Orion Alt/Az Atlas Pro and I put it through its paces.   Without SkyFi and SSF the go to's were accurate, once the best stars were picked.  Once SkyFi and SSF was hooked up, all the same issues appeared as in above, namely, initial object which was centered in the EP was off center in SSF.  Slews to other objects were barely in the 20mm EP or out of it.  ' Align to object' did not help.   Once I pulled out of the SkyFi and SSF connection, the go to's became very accurate again.  I repeated  this process 3x and there was no change.

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  Bill Tschumy August 10, 2018 14:14

  Thanks for the additional information.  We are investigating...

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  Bill Tschumy August 10, 2018 18:04

  Bob,

  It looks like Synta has released new firmware that is tripping us up.  They changed the format of the version string they send us and we were interpreting it incorrectly.  It caused us to send it coordinates in the JNow epoch rather than J2000 like it wants.  We have fixed this internally and will release it when we can.  Unfortunately, the fix will only be in SkySafari 6 since we are no longer updating SS5.

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  rpccss August 11, 2018 01:28

  Hi Bill,

  Good that we found the issue.  I guess I'll have to buy SS6.   I have SS5Pro now, but its WAY too much data for me, being visual.   Does the Plus version have comets which can be organized by magnitude?   My Celestron App which I use for my Evolution has comets but there are so many and you can't organize by magnitude, and its useless for me.

  Can you guess what 'release it when we can' means.   No reason to buy SS6 if its still not going to work for me.

  How can I tell what my SkyFi firmware version is and if I have to update it?

  Thanks

  Bob

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  Bill Tschumy August 13, 2018 13:42

  Plus has the same comet data as pro and can be sorted the same way.

  We just pushed a release out prior to this fix. We generally don't like to do another release immediately unless there was a serious problem with the previous one.  I would say a couple of weeks before this gets released.  We are really focused on getting Android SS6 out the door later this month.

  If you connect to the SkyFi network and go to 10.0.0.1 in a browser, you can see the firmware version.

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  rpccss August 13, 2018 15:59

  Thanks Bill,

  Just updated SkyFi to 1.3.4.  It was on 1.3.2.   I'll buy SS6+ soon.

  Bob

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  rpccss September 15, 2018 14:56

  Hi Bill,

  I bought SS6+.  Have you pushed the release to fix the epoch problem?  (See below) I see the android SS6 was done 2 weeks ago.

  Regards

  Bob

   

  Bill TschumyAugust 10, 2018 14:04

  Bob,

  It looks like Synta has released new firmware that is tripping us up.  They changed the format of the version string they send us and we were interpreting it incorrectly.  It caused us to send it coordinates in the JNow epoch rather than J2000 like it wants.  We have fixed this internally and will release it when we can.  Unfortunately, the fix will only be in SkySafari 6 since we are no longer updating SS5.

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  Bill Tschumy September 17, 2018 14:17

  The fix should be in the Android SS6.  We have not yet released it on iOS, although we plan to in a week or so.

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  rpccss October 04, 2018 20:26

  Hi Bill,

  Any status of the release in iOS?  I checked the update page and its still showing 1.3.4

  Bob

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  Bill Tschumy October 04, 2018 20:35

  We are still looking into a problem a user reported with some observation data.  We'd like to understand this (and fix if necessary) before releasing.

  We are also being stymied by Apple.  We tried to upload a new app and they automatically rejected it for some reason.  However, they can't tell me why it was automatically rejected.  I suspect we hav triggers some bug in their submission process but they are trying to figure it out.  We can't submit until Apple resolves this.

   

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  rpccss October 26, 2018 16:51

  Bill,

  Is there any progress in fixing this?   

  Bob

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  Bill Tschumy October 29, 2018 14:18

  This fix should be in the most recent iOS release.

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  rpccss October 30, 2018 22:01

  Isn't there a fix needed to upload for SkyFi?   I just uploaded the latest iOS 12.0.1.   Perhaps I don't understand it.

  Bob

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  Bill Tschumy October 30, 2018 22:29

  The fix was in SkySafari.  Nothing needs to change in SkyFi.  The version of iOS is irrelevant.