Hello,
I have been experiencing repeated crashes of Kstars/Ekos, occurring within Align module.
It will crash anywhere from 1-7 or 8 times prior to successful Align procedure. Once I do get through the crashes, it will work perfectly and my session will normally proceed without issue for the entire schedule. Getting through the crashes involves reloading my capture sequence and schedule, waiting for camera to cool again, and then starting the scheduled sequence repeatedly.
I have also experienced crashes during polar alignment process but not as frequently.
I am attaching logs that I just captured, recreating during a daytime test run of a schedule with lens cap on. Sometimes it seems that it is having difficulty detecting stars and will crash, even when the capture is full of stars. I have noticed that it will output not enough stars found just before the capture actually renders in the viewer.
Anyway, possibly the logs will glean some information as to root cause. Please let me know if there is more information that would be helpful in determining root cause.
Log settings screenshot attached.
Cheers!
This evening I reproduced again and found some logging information which is indicating out of memory.
I am nor sure to which components this is referring though. Can anyone shed some light from this log?
I observed activity monitor for CPU/RAM during a crash. The RAM was only using less than 500MB, it appeared the CPU spiked to 100% at the time of the crash.
Thank you
log_20-32-02.txt (965 KB)
In tonight’s session, I decided to make some changes to my plate solving and capture settings..
I changed my solving method to local astrometry from internal solver. I also disabled rotator because it has been acting really strange. In multi-night sessions using Fits for alignment it is wanting to rotate even though it is perfectly aligned from the plate solve.
I changed to the Linux Internal Default Paths, I’m not actually sure what they were before.
And then I adjusted my capture settings to a 5 second exposure from 2.5 seconds and bumped up the gain from 100 to 240.
Kstars/Ekos did not crash tonight which is probably the first time in over a month that I have been able to start a session without a crash. Hopefully these changes have resolved my issue.
Please let me know if you think any other settings should be updated.
Cheers!
Douglas,
Your log shows you are running KStars 3.6.0 which was created about a year ago.
There have been many bug fixes in the versions since.
I’d suggest that you upgrade to 3.6.5 (3.6.6 will be released shortly).
If you are uncomfortable with that, then keep a backup so you can revert.
Note–keep in mind you need to upgrade both INDI and KStars.
I’m not familiar with Astroberry, but I seem to remember it had a way to install old releases if desired…
Hy
Thanks so much! Oh, that is interesting! I regularly run the apt upgrade, update, and dist-upgrade. I wonder why that hasn’t been updated to current version?
I will look for information on force upgrade.
Hi Douglas. I’m having the same issues as you on Rpi4. It’s actually an ASIAR pro running Astroberry. I didn’t realise it was still on Kstars 3.6.0 and so will update to 3.6.5. Did you figure out how to upgrade Astroberry safely ?
Hi Douglas. I’m having the same issues as you on Rpi4. It’s actually an ASIAR pro running Astroberry. I didn’t realise it was still on Kstars 3.6.0 and so will update to 3.6.5. Did you figure out how to upgrade Astroberry safely ?
Not sure why it sent two messages 
Hi,
I think Astroberry is no longer maintained by the owner, and it was a 32bit OS.
Have you tried Astroarch yet AstroArch, it is a 64bit os for PI4 and should be updated.
Valentin
Hi Val,
The owner was replying on the Astroberry github site a month ago saying that Astroberry V3.0 will be released soon. Not sure if that’s true as the certificate for the Astroberry repo expired on 31st July, so nobody can now update astroberry. There’s an issue request on the Astroberry github site about the certificate, but no reply so far.
Hello Raymond,
I looked at Kstars that is available to download and instal from link available here on indilib, however, I was not sure if it was from same dist and was concerned it may install a 2nd instance. I was still researching this. I was also waiting because following changing my settings for alignment module as I showed above, my system has been running perfectly. rPi4 B 8GB.
Cheers,
Doug
Hi Val, I installed Astroberry from astroberry-server_2.0.4.img.zip on June 10, oddly it shows 2.0.5 when logging in to the server.
This is unfortunate news. I have not tried Astroarch but will have a look. Thank you for the information!
Cheers,
Doug
Hi Doug,
Mine’s 4G Pi4. I’ve made a few changes in the setup and will give it ago when skies allow next. I too was unsure if installing Kstars/INDI would just install another one so have put this on the back burner until after I try next. The guy who does astroberry said recently that V3.0 with Kstars 3.6.5 is coming soon, but not sure as his certificates have expired and nothing seems to have been done in the repo for 2 years. May have to look at Astroarch as Val suggested.
Ray.
Yes, if Astroberry is no longer being maintained then it will probably be necessary to move away at some point. It is encouraging that rkaczorek replied on July 2nd regarding a 3.0 update. Honestly, if this is the case, I am strongly considering just getting a StellarMate image. I guess this explains why our Kstars are behind in updates.