Can't get my mount to work with sharpcap

[CHR15]

Hi,
I have a skywatcher az gti mount. I have updated it to the latest firmware. I have downloaded the latest version of ascom and the skywatcher ascom driver. I uninstalled and reinstalled sharpcap so I should be on the latest version too.
Whenever I open my camera in sharpcap I get enclosed message
Error connecting to ascom mount
"An error occurred while trying to connect to yoursynscan app driver mount" and the the controls for the telescope don't show in scope controls.
What am I doing wrong?
Thanks.

[admin]

Hi,

if you look further down the error box, there will be a section that says 'The details of the error are: <something> ' - that something is the actual error message that SharpCap received when trying to connect and it will reveal the likely cause of the problem and also what might be the best thing to do to fix it. Without that detail, I can't give you specific advice, but the two most common problems are

1) Failure to communication with the hardware itself - There may be options to set this up available if you press the 'Setup' button just underneath the 'Connected' checkbox.

2) ASCOM driver not installed properly - this is particularly likely if you get an error when trying to use the 'Setup' button too. In this case, try uninstalling and reinstalling the ASCOM driver

The other thing to watch out for is that sometimes you need to be running a separate application on the computer that talks to the hardware as well as selecting the ASCOM driver in SharpCap. Not sure if this applies to your particular hardware though.

cheers,

Robin

[CHR15]

Thanks Ronin,
I've just tried again and underneath the original text I wrote earlier it says
"This often indicates a problem with the device itself or with its ascom driver cofiguration. Please check that the device is properly running and responding.
The details of the error are: no device found.
If I uninstall ascom and reinstall it again, will I need to to do anything with ascom (I'm not technically minded) or will sharpcap do what it needs to connect the mount.
Thanks.

[CHR15]

I've reinstalled everything and got the same problem so I repaired the ascom platform and sharpcap recognises and connects the mount. Sometimes when I press the setup button in scope control, it will say not connected, but then will connect. If I press the left,right,up and down buttons I can hear the motors working on the mount but it don't go anywhere, I've gone to the 32x speed (max) and it makes no difference. The mount will move fast in the synscan app so I know it aint the motors or clutches. Is this a common problem with an easy solution?

[admin]

Hi,

Ok, that is sounding much more promising now that you are connecting.

32x speed is 32 times the rate that stars move across the sky, so it is still pretty slow (about one degree of movement every 7.5 seconds, or 3/4 of an hour to do a complete rotation). If you are hearing the motors then I think it probably is moving, just slowly!

SharpCap asks the ASCOM driver for a list of the movement speeds that are available and then shows a selection of them as the speed options. If the ASCOM driver makes any higher speeds available then SharpCap *should* show them (a bug is always a possibility of course). If you can post me a logfile from SharpCap captured after connecting to and moving the mount a bit, it should contain the info about what speeds the ASCOM driver reports in the log for me to check.

You can find some information on how to find SharpCap's log files here : https://docs.sharpcap.co.uk/4.0/#How%20 ... %20a%20Bug

cheers,

Robin