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| I am trying to decide between the ZWO 183 USB 3.0 color camera and the ZWO ASI 183 Pro USB 3.0 Cooled Cold camera for solar system imaging. Can you tell me what the basic differences are. Thanks very much. |
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Cooling is necessary for long exposure shots to suppress thermal noise in the camera. You therefore need a cooled camera for DSO. Images of planets in the solar system are usually taken with short video sequences, from which software selects and combines the best images. During such short exposures the sensor in the camera does not heat up so much that cooling is necessary. The cheaper camera without cooling is sufficient. |
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(First, I'm far from an expert on solar system imaging) As far as I'm aware, cooling doesn't help much when it comes to imaging of our solar system. So, you're already saving quite a bit of money there if you only plan on using it for solar-system imaging. Cooling helps more for long exposures and deep space stuff to reduce the noise on long exposures. But, planetary uses shorter exposures, so it's less of a problem. The next thing that is important, is what kind of scope/focal length/barlows/etc you're planning on using? Not all camera's are built for all scopes. And it is very much dependant on the pixel size of the sensor. the 183 as a pixel size of 2.4µm, so it's very quick at "oversampling" if you're using long focal lengths, which.. you probably will do for planetary. So the 183 is not ideal for it. There is a reason why, if you search "ZWO ASI 183" on astrobin, you will mainly see deep space nebula and other things in the results, and very rarely any planets. I have a 183 for deep space stuff. But whenever I do planetary or solar, I actually steal my 120MM or MC guide cameras of my rig and use those. The larger pixel size just fits a bit better for that type of imaging. It doesn't mean it can't work with a 183, but there are better options out there. Other options like 462MC, 385MC, 174MM, 290MM, 224MC, 178MM. Those are more typical kind of camera's for planetary and our solar system, they tend to have larger pixel sizes, which suit highly zoomed scopes better and also higher FPS, because the 183 has a listed FPS of 19, and many of the others can push 60-100+ FPS, which is a big part of planetary imaging, collecting as much data as possible, in as little time as possible. Either way, it is very much dependant on the scope you're planning to use for the imaging. So start there.. And then look at what kind of pixel size would fit that scope the best. Is there any specific reason why you are considering the 183? |
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I have a ASI183MC-pro I use if for both Planetary and DSO imaging. I do not use cooling for planetary. I tried cooling on planets but did not notice and difference. I'm selling my 224mc because I like the improvements I'm seeing with my planetary images with my 283. At this time I'm satisfied with my progress imaging DSOs. So buy The pro and enjoy both worlds. |
