Tim A.
member
Reged: 09/19/07
Posts: 95
Loc: 40 30'55.0"N 105 3'19.0W
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I recently purchased an AirCable Serial 3 unit, which I am trying to make use of. I am powering it from a brand-new 9-volt battery. I am using a Windows XP Professional SP3 computer for the connection. It has a Centrino Duo processor and 2GB of memory, so I think it's up to the job. I've successfully connected it to my PDA using Bluetooth, so I think that side is good.
I've got the AirCable DIP switches set to 9600 baud and no handshake.
At first, it appears that I connect OK with the AirCable unit. That is:
- When I establish the Bluetooth connection, the blue LED on the unit illuminates steadily.
- In "My Bluetooth Places", the "AIRserial3X 49721 SPP" icon says "Connected".
- In the status bar, the text reads: Connected to AIRserial3X 49721 using Virtual COM port 7
So all that looks good, right?
However, I can't seem to establish a serial link to anything. First I tried connecting to my Garmin GPS unit. The host program (MapSource) can't find the GPS. I assume it should look at COM 7, right? And when I try to make ASCOM connect to my CPC800 on COM 7, I get the "Blue Screen of Death."
Also, the connection to the AirCable unit seems to be very unstable. That is, I can connect OK, as I said above, but in a matter of 30 seconds to a minute or two, the connection is lost, and the blue LED begins to blink again awaiting a new connection. Which I can easily establish again.
I notice that the signal strength indicator seems to vary quite a bit (dipping quite low sometimes), even though the AirCable unit and PC remain in fixed positions.
Any clues what I'm doing wrong here?
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Starbuckets 12.5" Dobsonian
Celestron CPC800
Celestron CR-150 HD on CG5-GT
Meade Starfinder 6" f/8
Oberwerk Deluxe II 20x80
Oberwerk Ultra 10x50
Celestron Regal LX 8x42
"Me? Crazy? Oh, yeah. Crazy like an ox!"
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rboe
Numbfinger
Reged: 03/16/02
Posts: 39466
Loc: Phx, AZ
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I have an earlier model - no joy either. Enough folks seem to get these to work though so they must do something. 
Best I could do was talk to my Palm Pilot.
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Ron
NS11GPS
Pronto
16" dob
15X70 Obies
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Thomas Pfleger
super member
Reged: 04/25/06
Posts: 106
Loc: Hennef, Germany
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Hi Tim,
when I tried to establish a Bluetooth connection between the Sky Commander on my dobson and a notebook, some experiments were necessary to find a suitable configuration. I don't have an AirCable as I'm using a BT adapter intended for serial/parallel ports of printers.
You might try to change:
* the baud rate. Albeit the Sky Commander claims to work with 9600, no connection was possible (neither using ASCOM nor using the built-in interfaces of several programs). After reducing the baud rate to 2400 it worked.
* Disable the "16550 buffer", if there is such a setting in the AirCable parameters. The 16550 is intended to improve data transmission rates but sometimes it might just keep the small datagrams exchanged between scope and notebook. Lacking a "flush buffer" capability, deactivation the 16550 option might be helpful.
* There was a "hardware flow control" setting for my BT adapter. It had to be deactivated.
I hope that you find a working configuration soon! Maybe that Cyrille Thieullet, the developer of the "Astromist" application can give some hints. Cyrille promotes AirCable and regularly answers user questions on the Astromist Yahoo group.
Clear skies,
Tom
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Tim A.
member
Reged: 09/19/07
Posts: 95
Loc: 40 30'55.0"N 105 3'19.0W
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Thanks for the tips. I've tried flow control both ways, and it won't hurt to try the low baud rate setting. But honestly I'm beginning to think it's just a bad unit.
As soon as I attempt to use the virtual port that the AirCable creates, it drops the Bluetooth connection. I can get an FTP connection to it, but that's not a lot of use, since I don't know the syntax of the configuration file there.
The worst is when ASCOM blue-screens my computer on an attempt to connect to the 'scope via the AirCable. ASCOM is fine with a hard wired connection, so I know it's something about that virtual port.
I'm hoping someone out there knows the magic. I sure don't!
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Starbuckets 12.5" Dobsonian
Celestron CPC800
Celestron CR-150 HD on CG5-GT
Meade Starfinder 6" f/8
Oberwerk Deluxe II 20x80
Oberwerk Ultra 10x50
Celestron Regal LX 8x42
"Me? Crazy? Oh, yeah. Crazy like an ox!"
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Rusty
Postmaster
Reged: 08/06/03
Posts: 16329
Loc: Brooker, FL
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Got to http://aircable.net/support-downloads.html and download the Configurator for Windoze. This won't necessarily solve your problem, but it may make it easier to address.
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N11GPS Fastar
TOA-130S
MK66 Std
Vintage C5
Megrez II 80mm ED Triplet APO
SolarMax 40
NJP Temma II
Sirius EQ-G
ST8XE/CFW-8(LRGBHa)/AO-7/DF-2/STV Dlx/ST237a/350D (Unmodded)/Mallincam Color Hyper Plus/DSI III Color/DSI II Pro
Two not-spoiled Golden Retrievers - Maggie and Casey
Sometimes I think we're alone in the universe, and sometimes I think we're not. In either case the idea is quite staggering. - Arthur C. Clarke
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Tim A.
member
Reged: 09/19/07
Posts: 95
Loc: 40 30'55.0"N 105 3'19.0W
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Thanks, Rusty, for the pointer. This thing is still DOA. 
--------------------
Starbuckets 12.5" Dobsonian
Celestron CPC800
Celestron CR-150 HD on CG5-GT
Meade Starfinder 6" f/8
Oberwerk Deluxe II 20x80
Oberwerk Ultra 10x50
Celestron Regal LX 8x42
"Me? Crazy? Oh, yeah. Crazy like an ox!"
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RandallK
professor emeritus
Reged: 11/10/06
Posts: 713
Loc: Nanaimo, B. C. Canada
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I'm running the Aircable with Astromist and my Palm TX. My mount is a Synta mount cofigured as a Celestron NexStar and I get perfect communication within about a 10' radius. I also lose connection if I leave it without issuing another command (go-to) but it retrieves the signal quickly when selecting the next go-to point. In addition, my Palm is programmed to shut-down after 30 seconds of no activity (user input). Why you're getting no response seems to indicate a weak wireless transmission from your computer to the Aircable's reciever. Accessing another computer to test this out would be one "easy" way. My gut feeling is that it's somewhere at the transmission end (computer), but, it could be a faulty Aircable unit. Incidentally, the DIP switch settings on my unit are 1100 as well, that is, 9600 Baud and No handshaking. You could also try an set DIP switch number 4 to ON (up) and see if handshaking enabled will work. Just an idea. Good Luck!!
Edited by RandallK (08/19/08 06:39 PM)
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Edward E
member
Reged: 03/26/06
Posts: 52
Loc: Tucson
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Hi Tim,
I had the same problem you are experiencing when I first set up My AirCable 3 setup. The solution is that you will have to download a free program where you internally reset the AirCable Serial 3 (using a serial programming cable or USB to Serial converter/USB cable) from 11520 to 9600 baud rate. Once you reset the internal baud rate all works well. When I get home I will find the program and I can email you copy. Also here is a link to AirCable that tries to explain this (not clearly I might add):
http://www.aircable.net/command-line-interface.html
Once you have the baud rate on the AirCable Serial 3 set properly it should work well. I have run my C11 with my laptop over 50' away with no problems.
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Edward E
member
Reged: 03/26/06
Posts: 52
Loc: Tucson
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OK, the serial communication program you need is HTPE5. That stands for HyerTerminal 5. It is freeware and can be found on the web after much searching. Seem s the company that now owns the rights to the program upgraded it with more bells and whistles and now charges for it but I digress. Fell free to send me a privet message on this site and I can email it to you. Now directions how to set the internal Baud Rate for the AirCable Serial 3 device.
NOTE:
Items surround by “ “ show what is being displayed on each line of the command line.
Items surrounded by < > indicate what to type on the command line minus the < > symbols.
Be sure your AirCable USB dongle is connected to the real comm port the operating system assigned to it, not a virtual comm port. (WinXP = control panel - system - Hardware tab - device manager - comm port.)
Be sure to read the following site on basic setup and use of HyperTerminal 5. Ignore the last part concerning GPS signal status.
http://www.spectracomcorp.com/portals/0/support/pdf/using_hyperterminal.pdf
AirCable Setup:
1) Install HTPE5 on your computer/laptop. Do not open the program yet.
2) Connect power to your AirCable Serial 3 device. The device will boot up (red LED), wait for the green LED and the flashing blue LED to come on. No need to connect the AirCable Serial 3 to the telescope's serial plug for now.
3) Plug in your AirCable USB dongle into a USB slot. Always use this same USB slot for the AirCable USB dongle after setup.
4) Now start HTPE5. Choose an icon to use and give it a name. Choose the com port that the AirCable USB dongle is connected to. Press the OK button.
5) Now set HTPE5 for Bits per second (Baud):115200, Data bits: 8, Parity: none, Stop bits:1 and hardware:handshake. Press the OK button.
6) From HTPE5's terminal type < + + + > and press enter. You should see after a few seconds “Aircable OS command line v0.7”, “Type h to see the list of commands”, “Aircable>”.
7) From the Aircable command line hype < l > press enter. This will show you the current settings for the AirCable Serial 3 device. The Baud Rate line should show 115200 bps.
8) Type < u > press enter.
9) Type < 96 > press enter. (This is 9600 divided by 100. Has to be entered in this way.)
10) Type < r > press enter. This reboots the AirCable Serial 3 device. Do not unplug the AirCable Serial 3 device from power.
11) Type < l > press enter. Should now see the Baud Rate showing 9600. If so you are done.
12) Type < e > press enter. This shuts down HTPE5.
13) You should now be able to establish communications between your AirCable USB dongle and the AirCable Serial 3 device. When communications are established the blue LEDs on both the AirCable Serial 3 device and the AirCable USB dongle with burn steady, not blinking.
I hope these instructions make sense, are easy to follow and gets your AirCable system up and running.
Edited by Edward E (08/20/08 05:14 PM)
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Tim A.
member
Reged: 09/19/07
Posts: 95
Loc: 40 30'55.0"N 105 3'19.0W
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I give up. I'm returning the AirCable Serial 3 to the manufacturer for a refund. I tried to make it work with my laptop, and the support guy told me that the reason it wouldn't work must be that my PC is "screwed" (yes, direct quote).
So to verify that, I decided to see if it would work with my desktop system. If so, it would prove that Bluetooth on my laptop is truly "screwed". If not, it would prove (or at least strongly suggest) that the AirCable unit itself was faulty.
I hardly need to tell you that the results were not favorable to the AirCable.
The "support" from AirCable was terrible. The guy would not read my emails in their entirety, but rather would read just far enough to formulate a reply of some kind. Generally, that means he'd miss the whole point of the message and the "response" would be utterly useless.
One email he received three times, with me finally begging him to read it. When he did, he declare my PC to be the problem, case closed. He made no effort to see if maybe there was something amiss with this unit.
And he'd make suggestions to perform PC-guru configuration modifications, without offering any guidance: "Set your COM port to not drop connections if no data." Huh? OK, I get the idea, but I don't really know how you do that. I'm no dummy around these machines; I've worked in the industry for 22 years, and have a MSCS to my credit. So its really annoying when I get treated like dirt.
Anyway, for those of you who've got AirCable to work, that's great. And for those of you who are considering AirCable, well, you might get lucky, and you might not.
I, however, recommend neither the company nor the product.
-- Tim
Colorado
--------------------
Starbuckets 12.5" Dobsonian
Celestron CPC800
Celestron CR-150 HD on CG5-GT
Meade Starfinder 6" f/8
Oberwerk Deluxe II 20x80
Oberwerk Ultra 10x50
Celestron Regal LX 8x42
"Me? Crazy? Oh, yeah. Crazy like an ox!"
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Rusty
Postmaster
Reged: 08/06/03
Posts: 16329
Loc: Brooker, FL
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That's a shame (referring to the response from Tech Support).
What's disturbing is that Aircable Bluetooth adaptors have never been "a walk in the park" to configure, its claims about the Series III would make it seem virtually Plug 'n' Play.
--------------------
N11GPS Fastar
TOA-130S
MK66 Std
Vintage C5
Megrez II 80mm ED Triplet APO
SolarMax 40
NJP Temma II
Sirius EQ-G
ST8XE/CFW-8(LRGBHa)/AO-7/DF-2/STV Dlx/ST237a/350D (Unmodded)/Mallincam Color Hyper Plus/DSI III Color/DSI II Pro
Two not-spoiled Golden Retrievers - Maggie and Casey
Sometimes I think we're alone in the universe, and sometimes I think we're not. In either case the idea is quite staggering. - Arthur C. Clarke
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Edward E
member
Reged: 03/26/06
Posts: 52
Loc: Tucson
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I agree with Rusty. AirCable does make its product sound like their plug & play....NOT! It was very frustrating to get the units operational and even now I am observing "timeout" issues not seen when using a USB to serial converter.
This is a hobby, it should be fun. Sometime the best solution is the simplest. I would suggest using a USB to serial converter to operate the telescope with your laptop. You can purchase 25ft of 9 pin serial cable for $6.00. What programs do you wish to use Tim?
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Tim A.
member
Reged: 09/19/07
Posts: 95
Loc: 40 30'55.0"N 105 3'19.0W
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Hi Ed,
Well, I do use a USB-to-serial solution, and it works fine.
I was hoping to go wireless, because I do a lot of public events, and a wire from the laptop to the 'scope is just not gonna work in the dark with kids buzzing around like bees.
Guess I'll continue to use the laptop as an adviser, and manually enter the data.
I use a couple different programs. The main ones you would have heard of are SkyTools2 and Stellarium. I am also using an astro-planning program from Germany, soon to be released in the U.S. I don't think I can say much about it yet, other than it's totally cool. (Stay tuned; when I get a green light, I'll say more.)
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Starbuckets 12.5" Dobsonian
Celestron CPC800
Celestron CR-150 HD on CG5-GT
Meade Starfinder 6" f/8
Oberwerk Deluxe II 20x80
Oberwerk Ultra 10x50
Celestron Regal LX 8x42
"Me? Crazy? Oh, yeah. Crazy like an ox!"
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RandallK
professor emeritus
Reged: 11/10/06
Posts: 713
Loc: Nanaimo, B. C. Canada
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I must be lucky...what have I done wrong? I had mine working in five minutes after I received it in the mail. However, I am using a Palm TX PDA.
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Scopes: Meade SC-8AT w UHTC
SkyWatcher 5" F/5 Reflector
SkyWatcher 127mm MAK
Mount: HEQ5 Pro
Cameras: Orion Starshoot DS Colour Imager V.1
Imaging Source Webcam DMK21AU04.AS
Palm TX PDA w Astromist and Bluetooth wireles control.
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Edward E
member
Reged: 03/26/06
Posts: 52
Loc: Tucson
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Aircable system seems to work just fine on Palm and like PDAs but not on laptop systems, funny. In the mean time, I will continue working with my system till it works right.
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Tim A.
member
Reged: 09/19/07
Posts: 95
Loc: 40 30'55.0"N 105 3'19.0W
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Footnote: Bluetooth from my laptop to my cell phone and to my older HP PDA works just fine. I wonder what's going on with the AirCable. It would suggest a poor Bluetooth implementation on the chip they're using.
--------------------
Starbuckets 12.5" Dobsonian
Celestron CPC800
Celestron CR-150 HD on CG5-GT
Meade Starfinder 6" f/8
Oberwerk Deluxe II 20x80
Oberwerk Ultra 10x50
Celestron Regal LX 8x42
"Me? Crazy? Oh, yeah. Crazy like an ox!"
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Edward E
member
Reged: 03/26/06
Posts: 52
Loc: Tucson
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The AIRcable Serial 3 device works well with most Bluetooth devices. Be sure to set the mini-dip swiches to 9600 with no handshake. I am using a Kensington Bluetooth 2.0 USB dongle to connect to my AIRcable Serial 3 device with MS Windows XP Pro. I have used CDC 2.76 & 3.014 with ASCOM 5 and Celestron Drivers, Astroplanner, NexRemote, NexStar Observes List, Virtual Moon Atlas 4 and KStars with this setup with no issues. If you use the AIRcable USB 3 dongle then you will most likely have some issues. NexRemote will give you an "Internal error" when you try connect with your scope and CDC will give you a timeout error if you use the virtual serial com port on NexRemote or other virtual com ports (such as NexHub)and Virtual Moon Atlas 4 will not communicate with your scope.
So, if you are contemplating going wireless and purchasing an AIRcable system; get ONLY the AIRcable Serial 3 unit and buy a Bluetooth 2.0 USB dongle from another vender. It will save you lots of time and headaches and you will have a plug and play setup.
NOTE : With Windows XP PRO, after my com ports for the Bluetooth device were set by the setup wizard, I had to go into control panel and manually enable the com ports. Your experience may be different. I do experience a drop of the connection on the AIRcable Serial 3 device when I startup an application that uses the wireless network, but a simple reconnect is all that is required and the system becomes stable. I have maintained the connection for 4 hrs so far without a disconnect.
I will continue to post new information concerning the AIRcable Serial 3 device use with telescopes and astro applications as I become aware of it. Feel free to ask question or post your experience with AIRcable or any wireless serial adapter. The goal here is to set ourselves free from the wire overlords. 
Clear skies!
Edited by Edward E (10/28/08 07:30 PM)
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