Unable to take 60s exposures with Altair 26C (<=59 OK, 61=> OK, 60s not OK) in HF2 Beta 6

[Kevin Jackson]

I have a weird issue uncovered after getting a new Altair 26C Hypercam: I’m unable to take - specifically - 60s exposures.

I can take subs 59 seconds and shorter. I can take 61 seconds and more. This is with 1.10 HF2 Beta 6.

I downgraded to 1.10 HF1 and I’m able to take 60s subs again.

I don’t see this behaviour with other cams I owned. I used the same session of multi-sub length exposures (I was doing darks) on another new cam (QHY294MPRO) and that worked fine. I assumed driver issue. I posted in Altair group, and after downgrading NINA to 1.10 HF1 it works.

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[Dale Ghent]

This smells suspiciously like an SDK issue, which only Altair can comment on. There certainly is no special logic in NINA that alters the behavior only for 60s exposures and only for this camera. I think there was an Altair SDK update included in HF2 beta

[Stefan B]

Hi,

there were no changes between 1.10 HF1 and 1.10 HF2 regarding the altair camera, except for the SDK update. Maybe this is a bug in the latest Altair SDK.

[Kevin Jackson]

I wasn’t paying attention to the long Altair version strings:
HF1 (works): Altair SDK 48.17729.2020.0922
HF2 B6 (issues): Altair SDK 48.17962.2020.1110

I tested AltairCapture, Altairs own imaging software, and it works fine. Couldn’t clearly see what version of SDK they used though. I’ll push this back over to Altair.

[Kevin Jackson]

I’ve just looked at the driver version used by the latest version of AltairCapture - and it is 17729 - the version that is used with HF1, that doesn’t exhibit this behaviour.
The problem appears to be Altair SDK 48.17962.2020.1110. I’ve asked Altair for comment.

[Dale Ghent]

Cool. Let us know if you find out any more info or if there will be a release of the SDK that addresses this

[Stefan B]

From what i can see in the altair fb group this is confirmed to be an SDK issue. Once the new one is available this issue will be resolved.

[Kevin Jackson]

Weird timing. I’ve just tested a new SDK DLL just this moment and it works: Altair_DLL_48.18030.20201126

[Stefan B]

As this was an sdk issue this should be fixed.