The 32 or 64 bits dilemma - QHY Polemaster and Sharpcap

[Frank_Astro]

Hi,

I have been reading about this for quite some time and I have decided to ask for help because I can't come to a conclusion.

I have the QHY Polemaster camera and I want to use it with SharpCap (no offense intended but their software is glitchy and I don't like it, and I have read that many use the Polemaster with SharpCap with success and that that combination is the best of both worlds). In QHY website, it is not specified if the driver for the Polemaster is a 32 bits or 64 bits driver, so I have "simulated" its installation and the installation folder that appeared was Programs (x86). So, considering this, for me it is a 32 bits driver.

In other hand, I will use SharpCap too for live stacking with my ASI6200 (huge 60 megapixel images) and obviously here I will have to choose the 64 bits version of the program. It is guaranteed that ZWO makes the 64 bits drivers (they are on their website), so no problem here.

Does anyone use this combination (QHY Polemaster camera and SharpCap 64 bits) with success?

Do I really need to install the QHY driver? (on this page https://www.qhyccd.com/polemaster/ if you click on the menu on the left side, on "Driver & Software Download" it will automatically scroll down the page to the driver and software download options - the driver that I'm talking about is the "System Driver") Or I simply connect it to my PC and let the driver automatically be installed by Windows?

I mention, too, that I have the latest ASCOM platform installed, but I don't know if it is all that I need and I can "skip" (not use) that 32 bits driver from QHY, or if I need it anyway.

The other reason why I want to use the 64 bits version of SharpCap is because I have a reasonable laptop with 20GB of DDR4 memory, an SSD M2 disk and an AMD Ryzen processor and I would like to take some advantage of these specs.

Thanks
CS
Frank

[admin]

Hi Frank,

I think I'm right in saying that the Polemaster camera is very similar to the QHY USB2 guide cameras in terms of the sensor and how it talks to the computer, so you will need to install the 'System Driver' to allow it to be properly detected by Windows. However once that is installed, it should show up in both 32 and 64 bit versions of SharpCap, since talking to the camera is handled via the QHY SDK, which is available in both 32 and 64 bit versions.

So, I would recommend giving it a try with the 64 bit version of SharpCap - I expect it to work, and if it does, everything is sorted. If it doesn't work in the 64 bit version for some reason then the easiest thing is to install *both* the 32 and 64 bit versions of SharpCap at the same time (which is perfectly OK to do). Certainly the 64-bit version will be better suited to your ASI6200!

cheers,

Robin

[Frank_Astro]

I'm happy to read those words!

Thanks for your help Robin. I take the opportunity to say that I got some feedback, too, on Astrobin, and that some users report that the Polemaster works perfectly with SharpCap 64 bits.

Regards
CS