Atik383 shooting bias problem

[BorisE]

Recently I've bought Atik383L+ camera. Nice product but I've got some annoying problem with it.

At least under MaximDL when I order to shoot bias frame error is reported and nothing is happening.

Yes, I still can get almost true bias frame by shooting dark frame with exposure length 0.2 sec (afaik it is the least exposure that can be explicitly set).

But this is not universal workaround - almost all automation software (e.g.CCDAutopilot) try to shoot "bias frames" not "short dark frames".
Besides - because of FITS header keyword "imagetyp" actually contains "Dark frame" and not "Bias frame" processing software (DSS, MaximDL, etc) can't handle frame type correctly and make wrong calculations.

So the questions are:

1. Is it possible to shoot zero length bias with Atik383 at all?
2. Does any other image acquisition software (e.g. ccdsoft, astroart) allow to shoot true bias frames with Atik383?

Yours truly,
Boris

[joelshort]

I can't exactly answer your question since I don't normally shoot bias, but if I remember correctly some people have reported problems when trying to shoot bias with 0.0 sec exposures.  Try 0.001 or something to see if that works. 

[BorisE]

I can't exactly answer your question since I don't normally shoot bias, but if I remember correctly some people have reported problems when trying to shoot bias with 0.0 sec exposures.  Try 0.001 or something to see if that works.

Thank you for your reply, joelshort!
At least at MaximDL you can't explicitly set exposure length for bias frames. Only for darks, but as i mentioned earlier shooting short darks instead of bias produce some problems. And by yhe way, trying to shot darks with exposure less then 0.2 sec produce same error.

I enclosed screenshot of the problem (MaximDL 5.18, Win7)

How others deal with this issue or this happens only with mine camera (soft)?

[MikeM]

I've been able to shoot bias frames in Maxim DL with no problem. But I shoot them in the Autosave function.

[BorisE]

I've been able to shoot bias frames in Maxim DL with no problem. But I shoot them in the Autosave function.

After reading your message I ran to computer and tried to shoot through "autosave" function - but without any success

What camera do you have, Mike? Is it 383L+?

Can anyone who also have Atik383 and MaximDL test bias frame shooting?

My camera: Atik-383L+ mono, firmware ver 3.27, driver version 5.5.0.33751 as seen in window "Atik camera setup" (under MaximDL - "Setup Camera"-"Advanced"-"Properties") or 1.06.0510.0 as seen in Windows Control Panel/Devices properties.
ASCOM 6 SP1, MaximDL 5.18, Win 7 x32 (and x64 was also tested)

[BorisE]

The problem is SOLVED!

The guys from MaximDL yahoo group helped me. I should use ArtemisHSC driver instead of ASCOM. Now bias frames are back

Boris

[MikeM]

Hi Boris, glad you got that sorted out. It didn't occur to me that you weren't using ArtemisHSC. Nice easy resolution.