PHD Guiding is designed to be "Push Here Dummy" simple, yet provide powerful, intelligent auto-guiding of your telescope for both PCs and Macs. Connect your mount, your camera, select a star, and start guiding. That's it!
Despite actually having a Ph.D., I've always had a tough time figuring out which way North is in the guide frame, whether an axis is mirrored (and if so, which one), how that's affected by camera rotation, how many arcseconds per pixel I'm actually running at (especially since a "2x" barlow isn't always 2x), etc. This is especially tough when standing out in a cold field late at night when all you really want to do is stay warm and collect good images of your DSO.
In PHD Guiding, all calibration is taken care of automatically. You do not need to tell it anything about the orientation of your camera, nor do you need to tell it anything about the image scale. The automatic calibration routine takes care of this for you. Odds are you won't ever need to set a single parameter. Just select your star and hit "PHD Guide" and let the software take care of it.
See submitted sample shots from users of PHD Guiding and sample shots from PHD and EQMOD
PHD Guiding (v1.8) is free. While a more advanced version of PHD Guiding is possible in the future as an affordable, but commercial product (at the moment, I have no plans for such a version), the basic version as distributed here is freeware (and will stay as such). Donations to help support PHD Guiding and its development are certainly appreciated. Like Public Radio, you decide if you want to contribute and how much.
Looking for the Meade ASCOM driver from Jonathan that actually works on your #497 Autostar controller?
Features
• Windows and OS X (Universal)• Simple, clean interface designed for ease of use.
• Arbitrary camera orientation, pixel size, scope focal length, etc. measured during automatic calibration process.
• Guides through ASCOM's PulseGuide commands for lag-free, accurate commands on a wide range of mounts (Windows)
• Guides through ShoeString Astronomy's GPUSB (Windows & OS X) and GPINT (Windows) ST-4 style adapters for lag-free, accurate commands on a wide range of mounts
• Guides through Pierro Astro's USB Guiding interface to support a wide range of mounts
• Guides through camera's onboard output port if present
• Supports the following cameras:
- Atik 16 series (Windows)
- Meade DSI series: I-III, color and Pro (Windows and OS X)
- SAC4-2 (Windows)
- Orion StarShoot DSCI (Windows)
- Orion Guider (Windows)
- Opticstar PL-130
- USB SBIG (Windows and OS X, but see Help for details)
- Fishcamp Starfish (Windows and OS X)
- CCD-Labs Q-Guider (Windows)
- MagZero MZ-5 (Windows)
- Cameras from The Imaging Source (Windows and OS X)
- Webcams (short and long-exposure - parallel port, serial port or LXUSB, Windows).
• Guiding in RA and Dec
• Intelligent automatic unidirectional and manual unidirectional Dec guiding modes
• Automatic sizing and stretching of guide image for display purposes.
• Image noise reduction with or without dark frames
• Real-time plotting of performance
• Freeware
Download PHD Guiding v1.8 (Windows 2000/XP* and OS X 10.4 or 10.5**)
* If using on Windows 9x, ignore any install errors. Whether it will work or not depends largely on the driver for your webcam. Don't say I didn't warn you.
** May work in 10.3.9.
History
v1.8.2 (3/16/08)
- Graph log bug fixed (1.8.1)
- Meade DSI III driver updated
v1.8 (3/12/08)
- Graph of recent history added (Tools menu)
- Opticstar PL-130 and Meade DSI III support added (Opticstar is on Windows only)
- Updated to new libraries for Fishcamp Starfish
- Updated docs
- Debug logging mode put in (Tools menu)
- Server mode (for link to Nebulosity v2) in place but not very functional
v1.7 (12/4/07)
- Leopard-compatible
- The Imaging Source (TIS) camera fixes (Windows) to support more models
- DCAM / Firewire fixes (OS X) to support more models
- Manual Guide moved to new Tools menu
- Various overlay options added (bullseye, coarse grid, and fine grid) in Tools menu
- Button added to take (and use) dark frames and Tools entry to clear dark frame
- QGuide code updated with version 1 of a horizontal line remover algorithm
- Max Cal Step Duration increased to 10s
- Tools menu item added to clear dark frame
- Fixes to recording of RA_Dist and DEC_Dist in logfile
v1.6
- Full Vista compatibility (no longer need XP SP2 mode) - v1.6.1
- WDM (webcam) handling altered for more intelligent handling of dropped frames vs. dim frames
- Noise reduction modes added (2x2 mean, 3x3 median)
- Atik 16 series support added (Windows)
- Option for subframe / ROI download only on cameras that support this (So far: Atik, SBIG). Subframes will be shown when a star is selected (Shift-click to clear selection)
- CCD Labs QGuide code altered to use new drivers from Tom Van den Eede. This driver must be used if you use a QGuide now.
- Audible alert added when guiding and guide star lost
- Dialog added to let you manually move the scope (at guide speed). See Mount menu.
- QGuide code updated for better stability
- GPUSB code updated on Macs to work with newer GPUSB adapters
- MagZero MZ-5 support added
- DCAM / Firewire library on Macs updated
- Long-exposure parallel ports can now be reconfigured prior to connection
v1.5
- Entire rewrite of the Dec guiding routines to better track large amounts of Dec drift while still attempting to stay on the same side of the gear in "Auto" mode
- User has choice between the original Dec guide method ("Lowpass filter") and this new Dec guide method ("Resist switching") in the Advanced panel.
- Dec now respects the "Minimum Motion" parameter
- Greater precision in star location, especially on Orion Starshoot cameras, resulting in more accurate guiding
- Initial (beta level) support for Firewire / DCAM cameras from The Imaging Source (cameras other than the DM_21F series - i.e., those with exposure durations longer than 1/30s) on Windows and OS X.
- Log file now has date stamp in name
- Fixed bug in connecting to SBIG USB cameras
v1.4
- SBIG support (Win & OS X): USB, Ethernet, and Parallel (parallel only on Windows). Note, only 1 CCD may be used on dual-CCD cameras, so if you use 1 in PHD, the other will not be available to other programs.
- Fishcamp Starfish support (Win & OS X)
- CCD Labs QGuide support (Win)
- Fixed minor bug in saving LXUSB's read delay across sessions
- Option to disable the actual guide output commands during guiding added to Prefereces. Useful for generating unguided periodic error curves on your mount.
- Impatient instructions updated
- Bug fixed that kept 0x278 from working as LE adapter address
v1.3
- When star is lost during guiding, button bar will flash red
- Detects small displays (e.g. 800x600) and scales to fit
- Buttons automatically enabled and disabled appropriately
- Can no longer attempt to calibrate w/o a guide star selected
- Search size now customizable (Advanced dialog) and default expanded slightly
- Advanced dialog redone with automatic sizers
- Mounts that do not support IsPulseGuiding (but do support PulseGuide) handled gracefully. Will turn off movement check (and alert user) but operate just fine.
- Max duration taken to 10s
- OS X version supporting DSI cameras and GPUSB output
- Stop button now far more responsive
v1.2
- DSI support improved. Can select from any connected DSI. (If using Envisage as well, please uncheck the "Live" preview for the camera you are using in PHD or enjoy the show as both programs fight for the image).
- Log file improved. One line per frame (both RA and DEC commands on the same line) and timestamps inserted.
v1.1
- Support for the Meade DSI, DSI Pro, DSI-II, and DSI-II Pro added (kudos to Sean Prange for the low-level work)
- Slider in control panel on the bottom of the screen now controls screen / image gamma (brightness). Position will hold across sessions.
- Advanced panel now has setting for the minimum star movement tolerance (values are in fractional pixels). The default is the star must move 0.25 pixels before a guide command is sent, but any value may be used. This value will hold across sessions.
- Installers reworked to better support Win2k and Win9x. Some cameras will not work on Win9x, however. If you get an error on installation, please upgrade to the lastest Service Pack.
- Dec calibration routine tuned to better take out backlash prior to calibration
- Dec guiding now has 4 modes: Off, Auto (as in previous versions), North, and South
- Font size increased and stable across monitor settings
- Individual frames can be saved in FITS format
- Abort/Stop button more responsive
- Logging of guide commands turned off by default
v1.0
- Logic of serial port long-exposure webcam control fixed
- SNR threshold for star detection adjusted to work better with Orion StarShoot
v1.0 RC2
- Serial port support for long-exposure webcams
- Timing of long-exposure webcams tweaked for fewer dropped frames (Please set your camera's FPS to 5)
- Camera Setup button for webcams moved to main screen
- Documentation updated
v1.0 RC1
- Long-exposure webcams (SAC7, Atik, SC-1 or 1.5) added with control either via the parallel port or via the ShoeString LXUSB
- SAC4-2 support enhanced by up to 2s real exposure duration
- Short-exposure webcams set to have 3 frame minimum for noise / dropped frames purposes
- Visual indication (box turns from green to orange) if its not sure where the star is (dropped frame, poor SNR) during guiding and during star selection.
v 0.9.0
- GPUSB (ShoeString USB adapter) support added
- GPINT (ShoeString parallel port version) support added
- "Mount" menu added to let you choose which kind of mount the connect routine will go to
- Dec backlash taken up before Cal begins
- If Dec cal fails, will turn off the feature, alert the user, but init guiding in RA only
- All values on the Advanced menu and selection off the Mount menu saved across sessions
v0.8.0
- Support for older "VFW" style webcams and video capture cards added
v. 0.7.1
- Multiple WDM devices now let you choose which one to use
- Saturated stars now show warning in Status Bar
v. 0.7
- Initial beta release
