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Problems Aligning Celestron Evolution WiFi + StarSense (Solution: Update Your Mount And HC Firmware Using The Latest Celestron CFM Updater And Everything Should Work - Read On!)

 

Total frustration, please help!

History first:

2 night ago I was having complete success doing manual, three-star alignments with my Evolution WiFi using SkySafari 6 Pro, but couldn’t get close enough to target objects (at least 3-5 degrees off target). Tried numerous calibrations, nothing helped.

Celestron advised me to go to the Starsense HC and restore the Starsense Camera (i.e., reset AIS camera). Also, Celestron said that my trying to calibrate on Polaris was a problem.

Yesterday, I reset AIS Camera and also, for good measure, on the Starsense HC I restored defaults (don’t know if this was a mistake). After the restore, I reset the time zone to -5 (Eastern United States) and daylight savings. (Note: I didn’t do anything with the original Evo HC, should I have checked the time zone, etc. on that HC?)

Last night, I could not achieve a manual, three-star alignment (one exception is noted below). Typically, I would get two stars to align and then get a failure notice, i.e., “Alignment pointing error too large, please try another alignment.” I tried this both in Skysafari and Skyportal—same results. After numerous other attempts (perhaps 15 tries), Skysafari froze (wheel kept spinning). Then, went to Skyportal and somehow managed to get three of three stars aligned!!! I pressed “done.” After all this frustration, I decided to see if, in fact, I had finally achieved any kind of substantial alignment. I targeted Polaris on my iPad, hit Go-To, and wound up pointing more toward Cassiopeia rather than Polaris!!!

I simply can’t imagine what else to do….

Date Votes

199 comments

  • 0
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    Keiron Smith

    Hi Conrad, 

    Please read this initial post here:

    Beta Testing SkySafari 6 (iOS Only) - Read This To Participate!

    Please also read the last post in that thread, from me, regarding the TestFlight redeem code.

    You are approved to access the SkySafari iOS beta testing forum.

    Thanks, Conrad!

  • 0
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    Joseph Luciani

    Keiron,

    I downloaded TestFlight and the beta app, however I did not see any option to enter the code you sent. Is there anywhere on the app (using iPad Pro) to confirm/verify that I actually loaded the correct program?

     

    Joe 

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    Conrad Sanders

    I have test Test Flight app downloaded on my iPad but I need a redeem code to get the Beta Version.

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    Conrad Sanders

    I downloaded the Beta version when I got home from version  6.3.0 to 6.4.1 on my iPad. I left the older version on my iPhone as a backup and I hope to get out to test soon to make sure the Star Sense Alignment issue is fixed.  I am confident the issue will be fixed since I tested the Celestron Sky Portal a few weeks ago and the issue was resolved.

    Hope to get Clear Skies soon so I can test soon.

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    Conrad Sanders

    The Beta Sky Safari Pro Version 6.4.2 resolved this problem which I tested last night.  I have to say it was an interesting night with me chasing my Bahtinov Focus Mask around the parking lot with the gusty wind conditions.  Not sure why I continue to live in this state to take up this new hobby.

    Conrad

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    Randy Smailer

    Joseph & Keiron - I haven't been on this thread for months, so I checked in to see if any progress has been made. Similar to Joseph, I still receive the “Alignment pointing error too large, please try another alignment” error followed by Skysafari freezing and rebooting when I attempt to use Starsense, Skysafari, and Skyportal on my Nexstar 6. Has the problem still not been resolved? Luckily, I can use Starsense as a stand alone, but I feel as though I wasted my money on Skyportal and Skysafari!

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    Joseph Luciani

    Just checking in. After many months of struggle, it was determined that my mount was defective. I now have a new mount and although I’ve only had two occasions to try things out, I had absolutely no problem. I’ll admit, I’m still waiting for the other shoe to drop and wind up with a “pointing error,” but after two flawless evenings, I’m beginning to feel that maybe I’m good-to-go. I’ll report back, hopefully confirming my ongoing success. Fingers crossed.

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    Conrad Sanders

    I was able to test the Beta code back in March April and it resolved my problem using Celestron’s Sky Portal and Sky Safari Pro 6 .

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    Randy Smailer

    Was there any beta testing for the Android version?

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    Woody

    This sure is taking a long time to solve!  I spent a couple of hours with my Evolution and SkySafari-5 Pro and SkySafari-6 Pro Android versions this evening and made no progress getting SkySafari to control the mount directly using the mount's built-in WiIFi.  A fellow club member is successfully using his iOS version of SkySafari-5 Pro to control his Evo mount with StarSense.  And I'd read that others are able to still use SkySafari-5 Pro too.  So I re-loaded SkySfari-5 Pro into my Android phone, but no joy.

    All I can think is that the very latest Celestron firmware update for the Evolution mount that fixed the GPS roll-over problem and some other proglems, must have screwed up how it communicates its position back to SkySafari.  I'll ask the guy in our club who is successfully controlling his Evo with SkySafari-5 Pro how he's doing it exactly -- and whether or not he updated his Evo firmware with the July 26th update.

    With both versions of SkySafari, the mount isn't successfully communicating its position to SkySafari.  Even when I do a simple "Connect", SkySafari thinks the mount is somewhere other than where it really is.

    And as others have commented, I CAN successfully use SS with the SS HC, and I can do a SS Auto-Align using the SS HC, and then connect SkySafari-6 Pro using either SkyBT (Bluetooth), or SkyFi-III (WiFi) and serially connect to the SS HC, and everything works as It used to -- as in correctly.

    FYI, for those of you using Evolution mounts, the proper setting in SkySafari to use a serial connection to SkySafari (either Bluetooth or WiFi) is "Celestron CPC Series."  There is no Celestron Evolution setting.  But Celestron CPC worked for me.  At least, that's what worked this evening.

    The only thing I didn't try this evening was trying Celestron's Android version of SkyPortal.  Darn, I should have tried that.  But if the SkySafari guys haven't got a working Android version of SkySafari yet, then I doubt SkyPortal's Android version will be updated yet either.

     

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    Randy Smailer

    Thank you Woody. I'm hoping someone will eventually solve this and I'll feel like I didn't waste money on Sky Portal and Sky Safari.

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    Andi Willi

    my fail was to upgrade the skysafari 6 pro on android.

    since i do that i get a platesolve error whit starsense alignment. only skyportal is working well.

    why is not possible to download a old  working version of skysafari 6 pro ?

     

  • 0
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    Woody

    Andi,

    It IS possible to download old versions of SkySafari.  I just recently learned how to do this -- and I learned it from this forum.

    Go to Google Play and tap the options icon at the top left (three horizontal bars).  After tapping the options icon you "should" see a bunch of options.  The first one is "My apps and games."  Tap it.

    You'll get a list of the APPs currently installed in your device.  Near the top of this screen you should see three words, "Updates  Installed  Library."  Updates will probably be underlined.  And on my phone, "Updates" is green.  Tap the last one on the right, "Library."

    "Library" should turn green with an underline.  You'll get a list of all the APP's you've purchased and downloaded in the past, but are no longer installed on your device.  Scroll down to the older version of SkySafari you want.  Tap the "Install" button to the right of it.  This will install the old version.

    I did this, re-installed SkySafari-5 Pro, and it did NOT solve the problem for me.  I suspect that's because I'm running the very latest version of Celestron's firmware for the Evolution mount.  And I further suspect that's where the problem is.  Just last Friday night I was at a public outreach event with a fellow club member who also has an Evolution mount with StarSense and he's able to run his Evolution mount with StarSense using both SkySafari-5 Pro and the latest version of SkyPortal.  He has NOT updated the firmware in his Evolution mount recently.  So I'm thinking that's the difference -- which version of Celestron Evolution firmware your mount is running.

    Good luck.  As for me, I've found that I can run SkySafari-5 Pro or SkySafari-6 Pro and control my Evo mount so long as I change the scope mount setting to "Celestron CPC Series," use the Celestron StarSense HC to do the auto-align, and then connect to SkySafari on my phone or tablet using either a SkyBT serial to Bluetooth device, or SkyFi-III WiFi device connected to my HC's serial connection on the bottom of the HC.  I have the older SS HC with RS-232 serial connection.  If you have the newer one that has a USB serial connection at the bottom of your SS HC, you'll need to use either a SkyFi-III, or the previous model SkyFi-USB serial to USB devices.

    Using one of those configurations, you'll be able to control your mount using SkySafari as always -- you just won't be able to auto-align through SkySafari.  You'll have to auto-align the old-fashioned way -- using the SS HC.  And until this problem gets worked out, that's how I'm controlling my Evo.  

    That said, I understand that the very latest software for the Celestron SkyPortal APP now works with the Evo and you can auto-align and control the mount using that similar, but stripped-down APP.  I haven't tried that yet.

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    Andi Willi

    the 1 gb download just over wifi will solve thje broken update from august ?

    my wifi is slow. maybe is not worth to download it

    i really miss a old apk archive from skysafari 6.....

    since 3 months is not working.  i hope a new update comming soon. 

  • 0
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    Woody

    Andi,

    If you read through these posts you'll realize that the problem isn't just SkySafari.  It's that Celestron changed the firmware -- so "old" SkySafari no longer works.  SkySafari has to change the APP so it works with the latest Celestron firmware.

    You CAN re-load old versions of SkySafari.  I did it.  I downloaded SkySafari-5 Pro.  But it too no longer works with the latest Celestron firmware update.  There's a guy in our club who never updated his Evo mount and it still works with SkySafari-5 Pro and 6 Pro.  That's because he's running the old Celestron firmware.

    The SkySafari guys have figured out the problem and have made the appropriate changes to the free Celestron SkyPortal APP (which the SkySafari guys wrote for Celestron).  And that was almost a month ago.  I understand they have Beta tested the iOS version of SkySafari-6 Pro and it works -- and is probably out now.  I don't know why it's taking so long to get a working version of the Android APP out.

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    Roberto Abraham

    I can confirm that this is still a problem - on my Galaxy Note 9, StarSense automated alignment on my Evolution mount works with the SkyPortal application but not with SkySafari. Hopefully this will get fixed soon as I am really enjoying the features in SkySafari that aren't in SkyPortal.

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    Eugenetudico

    Bonjour,

    Même soucis  lors de tentatives d’alignements. Via Ipad les curseurs de directions ne fonctionnent plus alors qu’avec Androïde cela fonctionne.  

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    Lauren Whoolery

    I also want to know about that. I am going to share this question https://support.simulationcurriculum.com/hc/en-us/community/posts/360015646374-Problems-Aligning-Celestron-619 area code-Evolution-WiFi-StarSense?page=7 with my friends and brother. Hope so, he knows something about this.

    Please wait for my next reply with good answer as soon as possible.

  • 0
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    Woody

    Lauren,

    If you look at the dates on these posts you'll see that the last active ones date back to 2019.  Celestron solved this problem two years ago.  If you update your mount and HC firmware (using the latest Celestron CFM updater) everything should work -- it does for me and has for the past two years.

    It works on my Evolution mount and CPC-1100 Deluxe, both with StarSense.  And by the way, I live in the 619 area code also -- although that doesn't have anything to do with things.  SS Auto-align now works with my Evo's built-in Celestron WiFi, with my Celestron SkyPortal WiFi, with SkyFi-III, etc.  Everything just plain works again.  And it all came down to a bad Celestron StarSense database -- took 18 months to track down and fix.  But it's been working now for 2 years.

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