SGP crashing during imaging session (3 out of 5 nights now...)

Sequence Generator SGPro Support
1

Dear all (especially developers / support, I have active subscription)

I very much like SGP. Nevertheless, I have some trouble which really impacts my imaging sessions. It happens in almost every second night that SGP crashes (application closes) or my mini-PC freezes. So: Two types of undesired events: 1. PC freezing or 2. SGP crashing, while windows stays in a workable state without showing any error or notification.

When SGP just crashes, I am not loosing valuable imaging time (clear sky nights are rare events in my regions. Winter: rain, clouds. Summer: not dark enough), it also happens that my mount goes on tracking as end of sequence steps are not initiated (as SGP is no longer running). I am a little worried that I get a pier collision or something else. These things usually happen in the second part of the night, when I go to bed and when the whole system is unattended.

I am not a PC expert. But it seems that this happens during image capture. The windows log files reflect the issue, when the SGP crashed. They show that there were issues with SGP and with the module ASICamera2_ASCOM_x64.dll . So, what does this mean? And how can this be solved?

I have made log files from three nights with issues available through the following link. In those folders, I copied win log files (only present when SGP crashed, and not, when the PC froze), SGP log files and SGP sequences.

Here, some background information on issues:

  • 2022-03-23 SGP crashed (app was closed) at 1:46 am
  • 2022-03-05 SGP crashed (app was closed) at 1:42 am
  • 2022-03-03 SGP mini-PC completely froze, no win-log data, time: 1:55 am

It is also remarkable that these events preferentially seem to happen a relatively short time when I leave my imaging PC alone and go to bed. I usually control my mini-PC through remote desktop using “Jump”-app on my ipad. I usually close Jump and also Skysafari when I go to bed. I do not know whether this is coincidence (what I actually assume) or whether there is a relation.

I do only have two apps running on my PC during imaging. SGP and PHD2. My ZWO cams are controlled trough ASCOM. In the last imaging session, I also closed down all other stuff, such as Pegasus Astro Power Box advanced user interface. I control my mount through Sky Safari Pro (newest version) using SGP’s external control.

Here some hard- and software information:
I use an i5 mini PC with Win10 Pro, 8GB RAM, 128 GB SSD + second 500GB SSD. It’s an ACEPC CK2 (seems to have vanished from the market this year). I am using the latest SGP4 64 Bit version (the 4.0.700). The sequences likely were created on an older version of SGP (where I sometimes also had this freezing issue, but I changed equipment often and cannot make accurate statements anymore). I have ASCOM 6.5 SP. A ZWO asi2600MM and asi178 (guidecam), EAF focuser and an EFW filter wheel (7x2”). These devices are all connected (USB + power) through a Pegasus Astro Powerbox Advance. I use a CEM 70 mount with ipolar. PHD2 2.6.10. So far I used the ZWO ASCOM driver 6.5.1.13 and older versions. Today I updated to 6.5.2, which I have not tried out so far.

Cable issues are very unlikely. Two years ago I spend a lot of time finding out which cables are good, what is the maximum length, etc. Never had any download issues with images since I optimized cables two years ago. Everything is powered by a 230V AC waterproof powerline in garden where I installed two power transformers, one for the mini-PC (that one which came with the PC) and also a second 12V converter (150W) which provides 12 DC output for allastro stuff. The PC has wifi connection, and in each night I control it through remote desktop. I also have a small TFT and small keyboard for direct access at my imaging rig.

So… I have no idea what is the reason for crashing or freezing. But since this happened in three of my last 5 imaging nights, I really need to solve it. I have no ideas whether this is a software or a hardware issue. But it seems it has something to do with the ZWO-ASCOM-X64 driver. So, what could I do?

Just one last comments. I also shot dark libraries in the basement of our house. Here, I use the same mini-PC, but no mount, no guidesope and other equipment. Just the PC with the camera. While shooting a very large dark library (also for other cams), I experienced PC freezing only once so far. These issues appear to be more rare under these condition. However, I do not have a sound statictic basis (I hope that this issue will be solved prior to establishing large statistical data…).

Any comments are HIGHLY welcome. Please …. I need some help :slight_smile:

Thank you very much
Best wishes
Jan

2

Hi @jan.frenzel

There are a few pieces of evidence that point to the machine’s interaction with the camera as the source of the crash (as you suggested):

  • The windows log points to ASICamera2_ASCOM_x64.dll which is the camera’s driver
  • Other users of the same version of SGPro do not experience this crash
  • Last, one of the behaviors of the .NET platform we use to make SGPro is that it will, when it crashes, almost always log the last thing that happened. In this case, none of your logs have any indication of this “last action”. In almost all circumstances, this means that the crash occurred outside of the .NET framework at a very low level in Windows (in this case, most certainly the USB hardware layer). When crashes occur here, control of the execution is never returned to SGPro… Windows just terminates the app.

In your place, I would:

  • Completely uninstall the ASI drivers and reinstall 6.5.2. I don’t know how the driver installer works, but it may take a different path when it is upgrading a driver vs. installing a new one
  • Reinstall the latest version of ASCOM
  • If the camera is connected to a USB hub, temporarily find a way to run a sequence with the camera connected directly to the PC. The comment you made about shooting darks with a higher rate of success may have to do with less traffic on the USB hub.

If none of this works, we can certainly work with you, but we’ll want to get ZWO involved because, from the perspective of SGPro, we just don’t have enough information to help. We’d need access to the camera’s logs, the ASCOM camera logs and likely some expertise about how the driver functions from ZWO engineers.

3

Dear Ken,

thank was very helpful. Thank you also very much for your very quick response. All those thinks you have mentioned are now on my to-do list. I hoped, the list would be a little shorter, but that is ok. I guess it will take some time to check all those points. But, let’s stay in contact. I’ll be back in the (hopefully) near future :slight_smile:

Thank you very much, and all the best
Jan

4

I think we all hope for this, but, in the end, the list always wins.

1 Like
5

After using SGP for many years i don’t think i’ve seen a single time that the PC has frozen or restarted when using SGP.
Might be an idea to update all the drivers for the PC and also do a stress test, it could be related to memory errors etc. Maybe try Memtest86 for a good test for the ram.
Sounds like you’ve had the problem for a while since you also had the problem with an older SGP version?

1 Like
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Hi! Yes. That is an older problem. But these issues appeared much more often during recent imaging sessions. Thanks for pointing me to memtest86. I will try it out. In the meantime, I have updated all drivers. Last night, I have had another imaging session. Everything went will. Tonight, I will have another night with clear sky… I will soon start to make simulated shooting sessions in the house and also try to optimize cables (remove hub, etc…).
Best wishes, Jan

7

ANOTHER FREEZING EVENT this night. I uploaded the file into the cloud (see link in initial post). The sequence file got damaged and no longer could be opened.
The last entry in the SGP log is:
[03/24/22 22:28:52.208][DEBUG][MF Update Thread][SQ;CC;] Performing serialize…

Conclusions:

  • Updating to newest ASCOM version did not solve this issue
  • Updating all drivers (also with new folder) did not help.

New possible reason:

  • I noticed that power saving setting in Windows 10 Pro had changed. Win was running medium power / medium energy saving. Win was allowed to switch off usb controllers and hubs for power saving. I have removed the checkmark for this option and switched for max power (no saving…).

All the best,
Jan

8

Added another freezing event from the same night as before. So, two freezing events in one night. This time during autofocus. I also uploaded it in the cloud (see like in first post).

Conclusion: Tweaking Win energy saving options did not improve things.
Next step: Cables and power supply.

9

Thanks. We will definitely take a look at the sequence corruption. It’s hard to say a sequence should never be corrupted when a crash occurs in the middle of writing the sequence, but we can mitigate this issue by saving to a temporary file first. On success, we will overwrite the actual sequence with it. In any, case, for your current situation, I would highly recommend disabling auto save until the crash issue is resolved.

10

Dear Ken (and all others!),

some news:

  1. I have had two imaging nights without any crashes or freezing events, which is of course very good.

  2. I tried to figure out what causes the crashes and freezing events by simulated imaging sessions in our house, where I just shoot darks. All equipment was connected and PHD2 was also active (only image capture, of course no active guiding in our house. I made simulated shooting sessions with all equipment connected, and everything running. The duration of each event was close to 24 h, with power off and hardware / software restart between events. Result: During one week, I have not been able to produce ANY crash or freezing.

  1. However… in one indoor shooting session, I noticed that the system crashed. I remembered that I had some issue to connect the equipment, previously when I started the sequence. And yes, this point turned out to be critical! I made a total number of 5 simulated imaging session, where I did not “properly” establish a software connection, e.g. when trying to connect to the mount while the mount is still powered off, and afterwards turning it and and trying again to connect. Same with my Pegasus Astro Power Box Advanced. Maybe, this is the critical point. When I connect to it in SGP without prior connection in the native Pegasus Astro user interface, SGP is unable to connect to the powerbox at a later stage (even when physical and software connection through the user interface have been established). In this state, it is almost sure that after starting the sequence in SGP, I will encounter freezing at a later (for me more or less random) stage during shooting. I made a total number of five 24h-indoor shooting with “improper” connections to external devices. In 4 out of 5 of these session, my mini-pc (all details above) froze some hours after imaging start. I uploaded all log files with dates in a cloud drive, accessible through this link.

So. It seems very likely that this is the reason for my issues. It actually happened quite some times when I had been imaging in the field that I had connection issues, which more or less where my own fault (e.g. mount was not yes turned on, powerbox was not connected in user interface). I did not pay much attention to this so far. But now, after this indoor shooting experience, I can say, that yes, these things seem to be critical.

All the best
Jan