Folks - apologies - this is a hardware question rather than software but the computer section seeemed the most appropriate place.

In order to remotely (say 100m) operate an observatory (mount and telescope) there seem to be two choices.

1. Buy a PC/Laptop and place it by the mount then operate the PC/Laptop remotely (network cable and UltraVNC).

2. Buy a USB extender - plug your USB devices into a box at the mount, connect the box (though and ethernet cable) to another box by your PC (100m away) and control the gear at your PC in the house.

Seems the USB extenders are about the price of a laptop ($1000). Are there any advantages to buying an extender? Or is a laptop the better choice (bang per buck).

And, even if the OTA/Mount was housed in a weather-tight observatory (with little room for an observer), would you recommend laptop or extender?

Cheers
Dave

Folks - apologies - this is a hardware question rather than software but the computer section seeemed the most appropriate place.

In order to remotely (say 100m) operate an observatory (mount and telescope) there seem to be two choices.

1. Buy a PC/Laptop and place it by the mount then operate the PC/Laptop remotely (network cable and UltraVNC).

2. Buy a USB extender - plug your USB devices into a box at the mount, connect the box (though and ethernet cable) to another box by your PC (100m away) and control the gear at your PC in the house.

Seems the USB extenders are about the price of a laptop ($1000). Are there any advantages to buying an extender? Or is a laptop the better choice (bang per buck).

And, even if the OTA/Mount was housed in a weather-tight observatory (with little room for an observer), would you recommend laptop or extender?

Cheers
Dave

USB was designed to go a few feet from your PC to your printer or what ever, it was never designed to run insane distances. I'd be inclined to advise you get a robust laptop.

For 1050 you can get a MacBook. The reason I recommend them is that they are good and solid. They can stand being horsed around a bit. Also, they are good value for money and can run Windows, Linux or OS X.

Big long USB leads just seem like asking for trouble to me .... I'd advise against it.

Bart.

I'd just get a laptop or other computer Dave. At least you'll have a VDU with it.

USB was designed to go a few feet from your PC to your printer or what ever, it was never designed to run insane distances. I'd be inclined to advise you get a robust laptop.

Bart - the USB 'extenders' use an ethernet cable to transmit the data. I'm not a techie but say you have a USB imager at you mount. You plug that into the 'magic' box, situated within a few feet of teh imager. The data is 'managed' by the magic box and fired out through the ethernet cable. The etehrnet is connected to your network. The key is, the ethernet cable can be 100m plus in length.

I believe that on your network, you see the imager as another network device (say like a printer) and you can manipulate it as such. The fact that it is USB I guess is irrelevent to the network.

They seem to be about $1000 for the four device version - so I'm presuming they have some really fancy electronic wizardry going on.

I'd just get a laptop or other computer Dave. At least you'll have a VDU with it.

There are currently four issues I see - security, exposure to the elements, reliability and payback.

Security - a PC/laptop could get nicked or fairly easily damaged (especially if I use the laptop away from the observatory)
Exposure to the elements - we've talked about this before

Of course, both these will go away when I get a fully secure and weather-tight observatory


Reliability - what would I do if the laptop/PC crashes? It seems with this extender box that reliability is way more stable. Also, with presumably much more simple components, there's less to go wrong. However, if things go pearshaped at the mount, a personal visit with the use of a local VDU seems a better idea.

Payback - if I get a second PC, I'd have to keep it maintained (software, hardware). If I get an extender box, I can concentrate on spending dosh on the the main network PC hardware/software.

If these extender boxes were much cheaper, I think it would be a no-brainer - but given they seem to be the price of a whole PC its a tricky decision for me.

Any further thoughts? Is my rationale just bull? And I *do* love those Macbooks

Dave

Dave,

The observatory / scope PC does not have to be a high-end machine. An old 500Mhz box with a couple of gig HG and 512 RAM is probably overkill. It also has the benefit that as you can get it for free (I rescued mine from a skip!) it really doesn't matter if it craps out from exposure or gets nicked as you will have it's HD mirrored on your house PC for backup. If the HD crashes or gets nicked you just copy the backup HD image onto a new/old HD, lash it in and you're back in business.

If you want to protect it from the elements before you build a proper observatory (and give it some protection against being nicked) you could always sink a couple of fence posts into the ground beside your scope and bolt a large lockable ABS plastic or metal "tool box" at a convenient height (or at ground level) with a small ventilation hole in the bottom if necessary and bung it in there. Have the BIOS set to "Boot on LAN" and put it in "Hybernate" mode rather than shutting it down each night. You can also set the HD to spin down after so many minutes of inactivity.

For my observatory I'm running just over 100m of CAT-5 cable down a conduit under ground and going for direct control from the house... eventually.

Phil.

Dave,
what about running it wirelessly? Could you have your mount controls to a 'small' PC like Phillip said? It can be contained i a custom-built protective box. All the extras it needs is a wireless card (USB stick, or PCI internal). Then, on your 'parent' machine in the house, run the controls from that? You could use something like 'PC Anywhere' to manipulate the mount PC, without it needing a mouse, keyboard and monitor. That is the kind of set up I would consider anyway.

Seanie.

Were the USB extender to be something cheap like 200 quid it would be a no-brainer but for a grand it's just bad value for money. I mean, you could get a nice shinny MacBook for that same money!

As for the wireless idea, be ware, wireless networks need to be secured and that's not as easy as you might think. This is not so much the case if you live out the country but for Dave living in Celbridge it would be important.

Bart.

Not being a techie either, I was talking to someone in the Cork club and he told me that if you can get your hands on USB 1 cable (all USB cable today is Ver2) that the length required can be as long as you need it to be and does not affect the running of the cable. The only other item you would need is an adapter for the USB 1 cable to fit the port on the PC (these are all USB2 compatible). I asked him because I also would be looking at a minium of 25ft from inside to outside.


Joanna

Not being a techie either, I was talking to someone in the Cork club and he told me that if you can get your hands on USB 1 cable (all USB cable today is Ver2) that the length required can be as long as you need it to be and does not affect the running of the cable. The only other item you would need is an adapter for the USB 1 cable to fit the port on the PC (these are all USB2 compatible). I asked him because I also would be looking at a minium of 25ft from inside to outside.


Joanna

Hi Joanna,

USB is only reliable/rated up to 5m. After that you need to use a repeater/booster to *guarantee* a good signal. For timing critical apps you might run into data drop-out problems with cables longer than 5m un-boosted. That said, you can probably go much further than 5m without any noticable degredation. Depends on what you are willing to put up with.

Phil.