Thoughts please

Hi All,

I am thinking of getting a CCD kit for my Meade ETX90.

What are your thoughts on the Meade Deep Sky Imager -
http://www.meade.com/dsi/index.html or one of Phil Dyers CCD cameras in
particular the Mintron 12v1-EX with the PC USB capture kit -
http://www.phildyer.co.uk/

Both look good with the Meade having colour but only viewing on a PC,
whereas the Mintron will take ordinary camera lens so I can use it for
birdwatching as well.

Does anyone in the group have experience of either of these CCD's?

Perhaps I should go mad and get both?

Thanks in advance.

Roger

Roger Hembury wrote:
Hi All,

I am thinking of getting a CCD kit for my Meade ETX90.

What are your thoughts on the Meade Deep Sky Imager -
http://www.meade.com/dsi/index.html or one of Phil Dyers CCD cameras in
particular the Mintron 12v1-EX with the PC USB capture kit -
http://www.phildyer.co.uk/

Both look good with the Meade having colour but only viewing on a PC,
whereas the Mintron will take ordinary camera lens so I can use it for
birdwatching as well.

Does anyone in the group have experience of either of these CCD's?

Perhaps I should go mad and get both?

Thanks in advance.

Roger

The Meade DSI has quite a few compatibility problems with people's PCs.
It might be wise to wait a while until Meade sort them out. However
many people including myself have it working. The software is not 100%
reliable either and I've had a few crashes. You can see my clumsy
effort at imaging my first DSO at www.snookums.co.uk

Check out the MEADE_DSI and the DeepSkyImager groups at Yahoo.
http://groups.yahoo.com/

Simon

"Roger Hembury" wrote in message
...
Hi All,
What are your thoughts on the Meade Deep Sky
Imager.........................Does anyone in the group have experience of
either of these CCD's?

Hi Roger

There are a good few people who've had PC issues with the DSI. Meade have
provided patches on their website and the situation has improved somewhat.
I'd make sure that you've got USB2.0 before considering the DSI.

Although a steep learning curve I've pasted a few images below that the DSI
has been capable of with a 80mm Refractor piggybacked onto my Meade LX90.
The obvious advantage of the DSI is the bundled Autostar Software which
operates directly with the Autostar handset on newer meade goto scopes. I'm
sure that with more practice, and a polar aligned scope I'll be able to
better these with time.

M42
http://tinyurl.com/6xsqd

M1
http://tinyurl.com/5pgbg

Horsehead
http://tinyurl.com/4l99u

Good luck with your choice. And feel free to shout if you need any further
advice.

Regards


Chris