STELLARMATE : A new start for your beloved Canon EOS 350D (Rebel XT) !

Par astrokraken dans Réflex numérique Canon EOS 350D le 31 Août 2019 à 23:12

Don't let your beloved old and efficient dslr down !

This new kind of astronomy-gadget performs several fonctions :

- low-power, extreme light-weight and efficient computer,

- command and control for astronomy,

- remote control of devices, including "vintage" cameras.

During nomadic astrophotography activities, the battery's autonomy is one of the main issue.
Especially when dslr and ccd camera are used, and controlled from a laptop computer.

New astronomy-gadgets, such as STELLARMATE, can now replace a laptop to control all astrophoto devices, with much lower power consumption (5V / 3A !).
Moreover, a remote command and control may be performed with such device.

In order to have a light-weight and low-power nomadic acquisition system, I have decided to buy a Raspberry Pi4B and a STELLARMATE licence.
After flashing a 128GB micro-sd card, I introduced it in the RPi4 and... it works !

This STELLRMATE give a new start

- to my old iPad mini 1 (for remote control, connected to the STELLARMATE hotspot),

- to my old Canon EOS350D (Rebel XT) astronomy camera.

Using EOS350D connected to a laptop with Windows 7 ou 10 OS was so problematic !
This "vintage" dslr is compatible with Windows XP, not more. Under Windows 7 or 10, it necessitates to run Windows XP on a vitrual machine (e.g VMware).

After several unsuccessful connection and control attemps (using the usual USB cable in "PC connection" + M bulb mode), I found a way to control the EOS350D trough STELLARMATE :

I plugged a "classical" intervalometer to the camera.
I don't know why, but with Stellarmate v 1.4.6, it works with an intervalometer and doesn't work without, even if it isn't useful as the control of the shots is performed through STELLARMATE.
With the later version (1.5.x), no need to plug the intervalometer.

In fact, this configuration makes possible a much easier use of the EOS350D, compared to the "laptop solution". It really gives a second life to my beloved EOS350D !

I'm very excited to use this device on-site !

As RPi4 + STELLARMATE OS 1.5.3 works as a hotspot, one can control with