Hello,

My name is Brian and I'm from Germany. I would like to try out Stellarmate X. Currently, I'm running Windows on my PC and I don't want to override it.
Is it possible to flash Stellarmate X on a fast thumb drive to try out the system?

I'm currently using an SVbony SV705C camera and I'm interested in purchasing an SV605CC.
Are they supported by Stellarmate/INDI? In the device section, it says "SV305 and above," so I believe my cameras are included, right?

Greetings from Germany,
Brian

Hi

SVBONY camera support depends on the version of the SVBONY Camera SDK included in the INDI 3rdparty drivers.
You can check it in the following Change Log
github.com/indilib/indi-3rdparty/blob/ma.../libsvbony/changelog

INDI 3rdparty drivers version 2.0.1 includes up to libsvbony version 1.10.2.

I have confirmed with the following models
SV405CC, SV505C, SV905C
I will check SV605MC soon.

Imo, flashing to a thumbdrive would work fine if your (PC) hardware is compatible with the kernel and modules of the SMX distribution (OS) and your PC is able to boot from USB. At some point some config editing would be required, so the easiest route would be unplugging your system drive, installing a fresh low price SATA SSD (or old hard drive) and install SMX there to try.
Just plug back the windows drive and it will run as usual.

I plan to upgrade to SMX, maybe also the hardware, as i'm a happy SM user on RasPi hardware, as it's possible to control my stuff with the app (on the road) or via RDP (or VNC) directly on the Pi in my home network. No other product is offering this to me.

Thank you for the explanation.

Unfortunately, my notebook is a Dell notebook/tablet hybrid that is completely glued together. I do not want to attempt to open it up.

I also agree that one of the best things about SMX/SM is the many ways in which it can be controlled. I like the idea of being able to control everything with my tablet. Currently, I am using Nina on Windows. It is a nice program, but certain tasks such as manual focusing and polar alignment would be much easier if I did not have to switch between the mount/scope and the notebook. I attempted to use Nina via RDP on my iPad, but the touch control is not very good.

Hi,

there is an easy but effective remedy: An iPad stylus
I was fat-fingering almost everything on my iPad Mini, which was too old and weak for the SM app, too.
When i replaced it for a used Samsung S6 Lite Tab, which included a stylus, i even almost enjoyed doing occasional VNC sessions with the Stellarmate Pi. It's also crucial to set a useful desktop resolution for the remote session.

Hello Brian,

It's not possible to run from the thumb drive. The easiest option is to get it from Astroshop.de

Well, you can actually clone a linux installation to a thumb drive and let it run off it (if your target computer supports booting from usb storage devices).
In this case it would be pointless, because you need a installed and preconfigured Stellarmate X OS as well as a Linux live cd with some tools for preparing the thumb drive as an actual harddrive (with ext3/4 and vFAT partitions) and clone the unmounted drive contents to it.
It would be way easier and more convenient to use by just installing on an internal SSD.