Customer Reviews

Meade #507 Cable Connector Kit

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4 star:		(0)
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2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(3)

 

 

I've owned several telescopes and attempted to connect them all to a laptop to run various astonomical tools. Unfortunatley I've never had a good experience with connector cable sets and this is no exception. I bought it from 1 supplier via Amazon who sent the wrong cables! I sent the supplier emails but did not get a responce, so logged a problem with Amazon. It all got sorted eventually.
I ordered another cable from a different supplier. Got the correct cables this time but it's not great. I have to physically hold the connector at an angle so that the connection is not lost! Oh well, at least it 'works'.
Maybe I've just been very unlucky....

I ordered this cable set to connect my laptop with my 10" Meade LX-200 telescope. After connecting, and getting no response from the scope, I spent weeks trying to troubleshoot the software and tried multiple PC's. Finally, I had to assume it was a bad RS232 chip on the telescopes circuit board. Before attemting to replace the chip, I purchased my own DB9/RJ12 connector and looked up the correct pin-out online. One site online (nineplanets or something) had the pinout listed just as the cable I bought was wired, but I noticed that the send was sending to one serial port and the recive was coming from another (the RS-232 chip has 2 ports). I rewired my DB9/RJ12 connection sending/recieving from the same port (not as the site indicates or this cable is wired) and it worked right away!

I was looking for a cable connector for my Meade LX200 GPS. There is a lot of information about the connection but I decided buy this cable because it is manufactured by Meade. It works perfectly. If you PC or Laptop does not have a serial port as usually is, you must be have an adapter, I recommended you one manufactured by Meade:Meade USB to RS 232 (Serial) Adapter

I ordered this product for my customer and it does not work right out of the box. I compared it with the one I have which does work, and it turns out that the new connector is wired in the reverse order( for the record, the wiring is not symmetrical ).

I thought this probably was a random error, so I requested a return label and ordered another one. To my surprise the second unit is wired in the reverse order too.

I think this product came from Meade instrument directly. I wonder if they have a batch of such defective products or if they changed LX200 serial connector wiring after I purchased my telescope. In any case, be aware this may not work on your LX200.

On the bright side, you can re-wire the cable yourself. It is a lot less trouble than running around trying to find one that works right out of the box. I would have done it if I was ordering for myself.

UPDATE:
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Waring, serious short circuit hazard!!!!!!
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An update to my previous review, DO NOT BUY this product!!! Apart from being wired in the wrong order, this product can potentially cause a short circuit. The un-used wires in the RJ11 to DB9 converter are left dangling inside the casing. One of these un-used wires carries 12V DC from the LX200 telescope. If the 12v wire hits the metal shell on the DB9 connector, it can create a short.

At this point I have no idea if this thing burnt my LX200 circuit. I fixed the short and the wiring order, but the serial connection still does not work. I've given my good connector to my client so I will need to get another good one somewhere before I can test my LX200. Only I do not know where to get one because so far both the 2 connectors I ordered from Amazon are bad.

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Update
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Since I left the last review, I bought another connector from a local store. That one also turned out to be wired in the reverse order. So I am pretty sure the whole batch of connectors are defective.

I contacted Meade support, they offered no compensation what so ever. They offered no option to check up my telescope to determine whether a repair is necessary. Instead, they wanted to charge me $500.00 and have me ship telescope to them directly for a "service". They even tried to make it sound like a good deal for the money. The $500 is the flat rate without rebate. I would still say it was not nice even if they had offered to charge me for only the part, labor and shipping. But at the normal rate, it means they also want to make a profit out of their own mistake. I do not see how this can sound right for any reasonable human being.

Lucky for me, before I turned into software engineering, I was an electrical engineer. I had a lot of experience designing and more importantly, debugging circuit boards. So I spent $400 for an oscilloscope, $50 for some other tools and a couple of hours of my time to fix it myself. As it turned out, the serial chip(max232) on the circuit board was indeed fried. I ordered a new one, replaced it, and my telescope comm port is working again.

I admit I am in really good mood right now since I fixed my telescope and ended up with the long-wanted oscilloscope. But for those who do not take joy out of digging through your $2500 telescope or feeding Meade $500 for no good reason, DO NOT buy this connector!