Guider image goes gray and cooler power issues STT 8300

Discussion in 'Legacy Models - Community Support' started by tom carrico, Jul 15, 2020.

  1. tom carrico

    tom carrico Cyanogen Customer

    Joined:
    Oct 22, 2014
    Messages:
    3
    My camera is 7 years old and has been mostly running just fine. Recently, two problems have appeared. I use Sequence Generator Pro and PhD2 for guiding.

    1) The camera cooler, when initially turned on, will cool the camera for
    awhile and then stop cooling. I can tell it to start and it will cool
    for awhile and then stop. If I do this enough it will finally reach the
    desired temperature and then cool fine for the rest of the night. I am
    not setting a temperature that will require 100% power. Typically I set
    for -30C and it can run at about 55% power. This has been going on for a
    couple of years and now it is getting worse, it often takes 15 minutes
    of me fiddling with it to get to temperature. I have verified the power
    connector is snug and have all the latest drives installed via the SBIG
    drive checker. It does this this the standard power supply that plugs into 120
    and the power coming from an Pegasus Ultimate Box.
    I have this problem with TheSkyX as well as SGP

    2) The autoguider is no longer reliable. Up until a couple days ago it
    worked fine, in fact, excellent. However, now it will connect and when I
    tell it to take an image it does so and then just returns a gray screen.
    I have verified this in TheSkyX and Sequence Generator Pro. At this
    point, I cannot guide with it at all. I do not get an error from either
    program, just a gray screen that refreshes at the guide rate. I have attached and reattached all the
    cables, cycled the power, rebooted computers, all the tricks I know.

    I have updated all the software I have, checked all the drivers,
    everything seems up to date. I did notice that there was a windows
    update a couple days ago and am always suspicious of that.

    At this point, the camera is non functional. Looking for some ideas for troubleshooting or if I need to send it in.
    Thanks
    Tom C
     
    tom carrico, Jul 15, 2020
    #1
  2. Colin Haig

    Colin Haig Staff Member

    Joined:
    Oct 27, 2014
    Messages:
    7,962
    Location:
    Earth
    Tom,
    Test it with CCDops - free from our website and see if it is behaving.
    I'm going to ask our repair wizard @Bill to get in touch.

    Have you installed any Windows updates recently?
    Check USB settings like Windows Power Management - USB Selective Suspend - should be off, as this can impact communication relaibility with the camera.
    Try a known good USB cable between the camera and PC directly, no hubs.
     
    Colin Haig, Jul 15, 2020
    #2
  3. tom carrico

    tom carrico Cyanogen Customer

    Joined:
    Oct 22, 2014
    Messages:
    3
    Hi Colin,
    There was a windows update on this computer the day before this happened. Always suspicious.
    I will try your selections and see what they yield. However, this setup had been working like a champ for 2 months (probably 15-20 nights) with no guider issues at all. Clearly something changed.
    Thanks
    Tom
     
    tom carrico, Jul 15, 2020
    #3
  4. Bill

    Bill SBIG Service and Repairs Staff Member

    Joined:
    Oct 12, 2014
    Messages:
    531
    Strange symptoms indeed. Not having experienced this sort of behavior before and the mention of a Windows update recently... I thought the Forum might be a good starting point on this.

    -Bill
     
    Bill, Jul 15, 2020
    #4
  5. tom carrico

    tom carrico Cyanogen Customer

    Joined:
    Oct 22, 2014
    Messages:
    3
    I am going to see if I can rollback the windows update later tonight.
     
    tom carrico, Jul 15, 2020
    #5

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