Hello, rather than just curse when I get a freeze I thought I will post and be constructive.
I frame my target with framing wizard. M13 in the two log files. I generate the sequence. All good. Click the cog in the sequencer and then click “center” (i.e. I manually center as opposed to it occurring when the sequence starts). I get a freeze when the plate solve interface comes up - the one with the four bars that go left to right it freezes on the second of the processes with the bar marching from left to right and repeating endlessly, almost as if it is waiting for something. I will get a screen shot of this later. This problem happened multiple times. I was so frustrated with this last night I gave up with SGP and moved over to Artemis and AstroTortilla so as not to waste a precious clear night which are few and far between of late.
This is intermittent problem but I have been plagued with the problem though multiple machine and software reinstalls. I have latest software and drivers etc.
I have this a lot… not really on the one place. I get it a lot when I click “cancel”. To cancel something I’ve requested. Maybe to abort a plate solve. Or to abort a slew to. I’m not sure if it’s SGP or one of the other programs. EQMOD seems to pause/go to lunch as well. So I often think it’s a EQMOD issue… of course we blame SGP because it’s what we’re looking at and clicking on. But remember other programs are being talked to by SGP. Then I wondered if it’s related to eqmod, is it the new BT dongle I switched to (and love). I need to go back to the cable to see if it eliminates the problems… not tested that yet.
Sometimes I’ll click “TAKE ONE” and it gets stuck and I have to click STOP. I was running a sequence of shots the other night and it said downloading after 5-6 subs and then just hung… said downloading way to long. I tried to abort/cancel and it hung. I often have to rebooth the computer and restart everything 3-4 times a night. I’d love to track down the issue. (first to test is the BT dongle). Sometimes PHD seems to get stuck too. I’ll get a WHITE static/noise laden image… I find I have to reboot it and the camera to get it back.
Hi Ron, yes, hitting the cancel causes it to freeze as well, i have also noticed that.
However, it cannot be an EQMOd root cause because I am not using that, just ASCOM and Sitech underneath SGP and the various drivers - all of which are up to date. I did update the ATIK drivers today there was an update last week.
Meridian flip always causes a freeze.
There are definitely no windows open asking me to do something.
Very frustrating. Happy to provide any logs or do any testing for the developers to get to the bottom of this.
Upon further research a few things for me to try are to assign SGP a higher process priority and not to allow power saving on the USB ports.
All my cables seem sound, are good quality and I am using a quality Startech USB2 powered hub. One cable connects my PC to the USB hub and the hub has mount, CCD, filter wheel, focuser and guide cam connected… Never been an issue with other software though.
I tried cable RS232 interface again (hate it as I need the control pad then) no help, went back to BT.
Having this A LOT. Requires full reboot of computer so I have to shut down and rerun everything.
Sometimes it’s clear that PHD crashed (or at least is stuck and waiting for SGP?)
Sometimes it’s clear that EQMOD crashed (stopped tracking - or again is waiting for SGP?)
Other times after SGP crashes those programs are still running just fine. (usually)
I thought maybe loss or dropped data via USB too - so I moved to a 3.0 hub, POWERED… and same thing if not worse.
I moved optional devices (guide camera can do 3.0 or 2.0) I went to 3.0 cable on it. Everything I could to try and speed up
data transfer. SHORTER cable to computer - (was an extension cord and now USB 3.0 direct).
Plate solving works GREAT as long as there is a image. Should I be pointing at a tree? or not rotated the dome in time to get a sky shot?
IT will try to solve NOTHING - so of course I “stop/abort” and this 99% of the time HANGS and requires full reboot of the machine.
The other night ALL WAS HUMMING well, 60 or so subs. I try to get a little sleep next to the laptop and a minute later I open one eye to look…
and DOWNLOADING… is stuck. I shut down and went to bed. FRUSTRATING. IT’s so hard and time consuming to get things restarted and to mess with a stalled segment. (I go to re-run it and it wants to plate solve again on resume, it wants so focus again (which is another problem) see my other post. And even if I do all that - it can crash again in 2 minutes.
Last night After investing about 14K in astro gear to get into this - I stopped and thought to myself. Is it worth it? Should I just sell the whole mess.
It can be frustrating at times Ron, that’s for sure. But hang in there man, it is worth it for the times when all works.
Back on topic, I have also encountered the stuck on “downloading” issue. And the associated “Program has stopped responding” that requires restart of SGP. In my case no USB hubs and direct connection to an old and small $150 peer mounted HP 8300 PC I got from Ebay that I bought to eliminate USB hubs altogether that has 10 x USB2 ports on it.
I do not use EQMod - Sitech in my case - so EQmod is not the cause of these issues. With my old setup of ASCOM/EQmod and APT capture software I never had an issue. I am persevering though with SGP because it is so powerful when it is stable.
Thanks - I have to try and track it down. Last night focus improved with my new setting, but I still crashes ever 15 minutes or less.
Seeing was HORRIBLE (high thin) but I wanted to get focus fixed. It’s close. (I need to speed it up now).
The crashing - is ODD - I think it’s SGP too (don’t get me wrong - when it works I LOVE IT AND ITS AMAZING. But obviously it needs some bugs fixed. I’m wondering if it has something to do with the “server” stuff? all the cross talk to other programs? It seems stable until a lot of going on… like PHD2 comes into play. (downloading, running the seq, guiding… then hangs).
I also had a clue of this - last night. A few of us have mentioned when we can’t plate solve it hangs. (even on abort or stop). it hangs.
I was doing other things last night and plate solve hung up again. But because I was busy doing other things I let it set. After about 4-5 minutes (guessing) it closed and SGP was still running. So I think the things that we perceive as crashes might just be “waiting” for other programs to report back. (cross talk between phd, sgp, eqmod and platesolve?
I had things running well a month or two ago - so I’m going to try and track it down… will try my old win7 laptop. But I have to get all the software installed on it (a pain) and not sure if I can installed SGP on it (I think we get multiple installs 3?) was it?
My crashes were few, then that number increased and now they’re way to frequent. (what has changed?) thinking.
Looking through your logs I see a complete loss of connectivity with the camera followed by a complete loss of communication with your mount. It seems your mount is connected wirelessly?
Keep in mind that none of the errors in the logs are generated by SGPro, but rather by the ASCOM software SGPro is connected with.
You have provided no logs for inspection so I can’t be of any particular help. Please note that SGPro is pretty stable in terms of crashing… only very few observe crashing behavior. SGPro is complex and is rough on drivers and hardware. SGPro accesses a lot of software to do what it does. This external software, camera drivers, scope drivers, guiders, etc will often connect to hardware at a low level. If that fails, SGPro still owns the failed process and can itself be affected by a crash.
@Ken,
Thanks for checking. Since I started this post I have removed the powered USB hub and connected all USB devices directly to a PC with 10 x USB ports. Cloudy weather has prevented me doing any further testing.
please open SGP and klick on Help. Select the menu option “Open Log Folder”. There you will see some text files (they have the extension .txt) named like “sg_logfile_” followed by a number structure which is the date of creation. Those are the log files.
Beware: older files are automatically deleted by SGP.
I will say that since I have removed the USB hub in favour of a mount PC, things appear to have stabilized very considerably. I still occasionally get a “Program has stopped responding” message requiring restart of SGP but nowhere near as often. This is interesting since this was a $100 mount located quality powered USB hub with one cable to PC driving six 6 other USB devices. All my drivers -Sitech/Atik/QHY and ASCOM - were up to date.
Anyway, I am keeping close watch on the SGP freezes and will upload on a separate thread the freezes I now get individually.
Sounds great - I’ll pull a log next time I had problems.
I need to track it down. I’m sure it has something to do with another program or both at same time or communication between the two or maybe to much usb traffic.
Last night - I wanted to get all my filter differences. I did a auto focus with each filter.
I found the results (interesting) they were more parafocal than I thought just figured a set like the SHO would be same, but the Ha was different. I’ll post them and see what you think. Anyway - lots of time with SGP and NOT guiding. No crashes. The only time I had a problem was trying to abort a plate solve. I suspect this is a platesolve2 issue. Should I be able to abort/stop and have it close in a few seconds. I think it did eventually close but was more like minutes.
Lum 35447
RED 35447
GRN 35447
BLU 35397 <— ODD? seem logical to you? maybe seeing shift?
SII 35447
OIII 35297
Ha 35694 <— visually way off
My goal is to set them so they are close enough for “autofocus for each filter change” is within range. Else as you know it can’t focus. I also changed my step size last night to 100 and had a very nice “U” shape.
So should I always focus with LUM and then make the filter change to speed up auto focus? TRUSTING the filter off set number? Or is it best to take the longer exposure needed for filters like Ha and use the actual filter for focus?
It only seems to happen when PHD2 is running. I’m using to ASI camera. 290 and a 1600. Wondering if they are conflicting in some way. Or if it’s some server communication issue between SGP and PHD2. SO OFTEN one of the 3 programs crash (SGP or EQMOD or PHD) but if I use EQMOD/ASCOM and SGP I don’t get a crash. I shot the sun the other day - long time with no crashes. Last night with the filter focusing tests no crashes. Both times I had PHD UP in the background, but not looping or doing anything. Is there a free alternate guiding program that I could test? Else I’m wondering if it’s due to both cameras using the USB line. I suppose I could test one camera on it’s own USB cord to another port on the PC rather than to the powered hub. ideas to try and track down the problem?
Those AF number differentials sound about right. My Baaders LRGB and Ha are pretty much parfocal on my F7 TEC140 scope. They are further out at F3.8 though when I move camera to FSQ 85 scope.
Yes, I have also started to suspect something to do with PHD2 interaction with the mount driver and SGP as well although you are on different mount to me and use EQMod whereas I don’t. I do not have enough evidence to support this theory just yet and it could be spurious at this stage but, just like you, I was working on my AF routine for several hours the last clear night I had and not one problem when I was not guiding.
SGP creates a new log file every time you start it. So the next time it happens go to the directory with the logs and upload the log of the crash so the guys can take a look. We will then get to the bottom of this problem.
EDIT: Also, just to add, I am not getting crashes of the SW - I am getting freezes that require me to restart SGP. There is a difference between a crash and a freeze. In my case there are no windows in the background when it froze, I was careful to check for that. That said, many of my problems seems to have vanished now that I use a PC on the mount with more USB ports instead of the USB hub, that are notorious for causing problems with real time interactive and bidirectional systems like those we use in AP. I have not had enough clear skies to be more definitive at this point.
I believe ALL my issues are now resolved. Last night went for 6+ hours not a single issue.
(a few plate solves seemed extensive… if I abort a solve teh window “STAYS WAY TO LONG” before it goes away… but otherwise was perfect.
I ran the USB from guider camera from the hub (where all traffic was going into one USB port on laptop) and ran the guider camera into it’s own usb port. ALL problems solved.
Good to hear Ron. Things have certainly stabilized for me too since I removed the USB hub. I did some guided imaging two weeks ago for two hours on M27 without an hitch. I need further time to prove conclusively that the problems have gone though and, unfortunately, the UK is living under one of the cloudiest periods in living memory. So when I will next get out there I don’t know.