Updating meade autostar 497 controller

I later found out that it was not compatible to the circuitry in the ETX and I hope that is not what you encountered. The motors arent connected to anything other than the worm gears. And they turn just fine with the regular hand controller arrow keys. Yeah it was toast because the ETX80 according to Meade used a different circuitry and only the 494 with the "TC" option would work in it.There was to my recollection some circuit incompatibility and the 497 I purchased which was brand new actually shorted out somewhere along the way. I hate to tell you this but the 497 is very particular to what it is plugged in to.

Updating meade autostar 497 controller video

At any rate, i hit CTRL-D and the handset shows that it is "Downloading..not turn off" Then i send it the 6 byte file which contains "P-yy VI" and i get an echo back of 43eg. At this point i still get the same thing ..."Press 0 to align or MODE for MENU" in either caseit goes to "Testing Motors" and sits there without moving the motors.

One correction - with the new HBX cable that i made, i never get the "Press 0 to align, MODE for MENU" message.

I believe you can further update the controller to a 43Eg. With this cable connected i get the same sequence of events as i described above, but when it gets to the part where it would say testing motors the screen goes blank and still, the motors do not move.

Meade Autostar Support Page Regards, Ok i got all the necessary components to make the HBX cable and the 505 cable. So instead of saying "Testing Motors" It now says nothing.

i then tried plugging in the new cable, and turning the unit on.

The motors moved when the unit started up, both of them!

I kept pluggin away and i tried to see what i could accomplish through the PC with the 505 cable.

I followed the instructions here to establish a connection and learn which COM port it would use. I get an X when the AS boots up, i get echos back from both CTRL-F and #:: GVF#, whcih returns the autostar version number (43Eg)the date, etc... i can't really tell if i am booting into safe mode, because the screen on the AS still says the same thing on boot up and gets to the Press 0 to align or MODE for MENU.

After leaving this message, the telescope will recalibrate the motors.

The telescope will need to be re-calibrated before you resume viewing If you continue to get this message with fresh batteries, contact Meade Customer Support.

Immediately after the Welcome to Autostar screen it just goes blank.