Live Stack Failure all of a sudden

[GoFraRo]

Hi,
let me jump on this train. I did experience the same problem with my new Altair Hypercam 294C Pro and the Beta v4.1.10872.0
I wanted to capture 120s frames in Livestack but after the first frame all others were dropped. I did exactly what you did and changed to 60s. This was on 7.7. - 8.7.
Unfortunately, since this date, the weather did not allow to have some more attempts (wanted to cross-check it with my Neptune-C).

Some background on my settings in Livestack:
Rawframes: save stacked
View: stack
Stacking: sigma clipping
Guiding with Dithering (every second frame, depending on set exposure), with "reduce exp while dithering".
Output format: fits, RAW14
Regards
Gottfried

[SkyShed Admin]

Thanks GoFraRo,

Close to my settings. I have not had a chance to try Robin's ideas yet due to to work and rain. I'm hoping to in the next couple of days.

CS!
Wayne

[SkyShed Admin]

Hi Robin,

I was out on Friday night. I removed the USB setting from my profile. Having said that I re-saved a new profile with the same (120 s) settings a little after that.

I created a "focus" profile, with only the gain and sub time being different from my usual 120 sec profile. At first it looked like things were going to work. I got 10, 120 s subs while it was light out.

I did a focus (in the dark) and started to stack w/ my 120 settings. It wouldn't stack.

I re-started SC and loaded a different profile. 119 seconds instead of 120. So I could use my 120 sec darks from my library. It stacked data of the Flying Dragon nebula for 3 hours, no problem. I ended up w/ a nice shot.

You might think "problem solved", but I'm trepidacious about what might happen next time I go out. Things are "hit and miss". Keeping in mind that I added nothing, changed nothing, used the same system, camera, and settings I've used for a couple of years with SC. I just cant put my finger on it.

Best!
Wayne

[admin]

Hi Wayne,

hmm, mixed results. I did manage to get out a new version today that has the potential work around in it for the problem that I discovered that *might* be the same as your problem - that's in 4.1.10910. If you have a chance, give that version a try and see if it does any better.

cheers,

Robin

[SkyShed Admin]

Cool Robin, thx!

It might be a few nights until I can get out. Fingers crossed.

I was going to attach an image but it's too large. Thanks to SC I was able to get 2 hours on the Flying Dragon Neb (SH-2 114) on Friday night. Rated a "most difficult" object. It's getting a lot of nice comments from astro friends in my FB groups.

You and I are friends on FB, Pls check it out. Thanks so much for making it possible.

CS!
Wayne

[admin]

Hi Wayne,

just found your image on Facebook - looks absolutely awesome, and it's obviously one of those odd targets that *actually looks like* the thing it is named after.

I tried to include the image here via an image link tag, but it didn't work. Maybe a direct link will work for those who want to see it

https://scontent-man2-1.xx.fbcdn.net/v/ ... e=64C48D29

cheers,

Robin

[SkyShed Admin]

Hi Robin,

I missed your reply earlier. Thank you very much! The Dragon is "all the rage" now with my imaging friends. Many were previously unaware of it. Seeing some nice results. Here's a link to my version with no star reduction. The versions I posted on FB were starless and stars reduced.

https://skyshedpod.com/wp-content/uploa ... bula-1.jpg

Thursday night was clear. I went out and crossed my fingers that I'd have success. Everything was up and running. I was stacking at 7 secs as I was focusing, just to see it happen it. Switched to 120s ... No joy.

Tried to think fast because it was perfect night for imaging. Decided to install the SC Beta (nice looking new features btw! ). No joy.

I decided to try to "downgrade" to the May '23 Ver. because I could stack then. No joy.

Finally. It was now 11:30. One a last shot. I tried your "trick". After not stacking the first frame, while it was working on the " 2nd" frame, I switched duration to 60 secs. Waited 5-7 secs, then switched back to 120... it stacked. And it kept stacking up to frame 24, failed again. So I just did the same trick (w/o stopping Live Stack) and it worked. Al the way to 70 frames. I got good data too. Cool!

In my haste I mav have DL'd the 32 bit May Ver. because at frame 71 a pop up box came up and said that SC had run out of memory and suggested that I d DL the 64 bit version. I think that was the gist of it. The program shut down right after that. (Btw I have lots of room room on the HD, and 32 Gigs of Ram)

I got 70 subs! I was happy.

At this point, for expediency when I go to image, the " trick" is working and I'll keep doing it. Log file attached.

Thanks for coming up with a work-around Robin! And your great personal support.

CS!
Wayne

[admin]

Hi Wayne,

that's good on two fronts - first you got your data, but secondly we've learnt a bit more about the problem in that it is clearly happening to you at random with no 'cause' if it is kicking in after say 24 frames are stacked.

I will check through the log to see if there is anything else I can learn, but I am now wondering if I can automate something like 'change exposure and change back again' if a long exposure frame is dropped on the 26C to see if I can automate the recovery. Of course, ideally we would get rid of the problem entirely, but that's going to be tricky unless I can catch it happening on its own in my testing (and, if it takes an hour or more to happen at random then testing a possible change is not easy!)

cheers,

Robin

[SkyShed Admin]

Thanks Robin!

[admin]

Hi Wayne,

no worries - I have succeeded in automating the recovery from the problem (at least the version that I can trigger by using the USB speed adjustment). I think that should work for you too, which means it will drop 1 frame then continue. Should be able to get this into tomorrow's update.

cheers,

Robin