Customer Reviews

Starry Night Pro Plus 6.2 [Old Version]

5 star:		(9)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(5)

 

 

Works great on my Macbook AND my Vista machine (which is used less and less as I revel in the joy that is "Mac OS X"). The amount of information available is staggering. I was somewhat underwhelmed by the AllSky survey, but when I consider it only adds 60 to cost (compared to Pro) and other enhancements are included as well, the "Plus" is well worth it. be prepared for a total install of almost 12Gb if you copy the AllSky to the local drive (recommended).

I can certainly understand passing up Pro Plus for just Pro, but if you have the extra, I think it's well worth the money spent...


***Vista issues seem to have been addressed in the current version. You may need to DL patches from the site for older ones...***

I wanted to address the reviews below concerning Vista compatibility. I received my order last week, version 6.2.3 and it installed without a single error, and it has worked great ever since. I cannot make this claim regarding many programs on my Vista PC!
The program is outstanding. As I started learning it, I would ask, "I wonder if it can do this?" Nearly everytime, the answer was yes. Truly a well through out program.

This app quickly exceeded my expectations. I'm an amateur astronomer, and I've loved astro software since its inception on desktops years ago. I've only scratched the surface of what Starry Night can do, but it's already blown me away in its realism, depth of data/display/control, and richness of capabilities. One example in one tiny corner of the app: if I want to track a satellite (say, the Int'l Space Station) over the sky, I'm used to downloading my own two-line ephemeris data elements...and loading them to the app (shows how long it's been since I bought a new package...). Starry Night simply phones home when you start it up, and a whole freakin' passel of satellites is already in there with up-to-date ephemeris...you can just turn 'em on and they creep across the simulated sky (ISS, GPS, Iridium...you can add any others). The UI is amazingly intuitive, and the display is stunning. The program also integrates today's online astronomy resources in inventive ways, and the user community is broad and vibrant. I'm using it under XP (so can't vouch for Vista or 7, though SN's website claims it works fine under either). I have also asked for support once (a license question, nothing technical) and got a prompt, professional response. This is pretty powerful stuff, and a brilliant use of all the horsepower we now have sitting on our desks (and/or laps, and one license gets you two installs). FYI, Amazon shows 6.2 version, so I was expecting to have to download the 6.3 upgrade...but it was delivered as 6.3. I just had to let it update to a new 6.3.9 dot-release after install.

I still have Software Bisque's "The Sky", which was the gold standard a while back. It still may be terrific and a good competitor to Starry Night (my last version was 5.x)...but I switched to Starry Night after pondering reviews, and realizing that each package came from an opposite lineage. SN started with trying to make a photo-realistic desktop planetarium (and later added telescope control), whereas The Sky started with telescope control as central, and later added photorealism. I have not tried Sky Six -- so I can't legitimately compare the two...but from my knothole I'd speculate each still shows its lineage: if you want extreme telescope/observatory control, TS would be the first place to look, whereas if you want the consummate desktop experience SN is the first stop. Maybe those overlaps are complete, but it'll be years before I'll feel like I am taking advantage of all SN has to offer (much less finding it wanting in some way).

Starry Night Pro Plus 6.0 is my first astronomy computer program and I have to say it is amazing. It was easy to setup and easy to use. Controls and options are very intuitive and just a click away. To control your telescope your computer needs a serial port (which mine lacks) but, since I have a dobsonian mount it does not matter much for me.

I am very happy with the purchase of Starry Night Pro Plus 6.2. It has been running fine on Windows XP and Vista. I have upodated the version to 6.3 online. The documentation is good and there have been no problems what so ever.

I purchased this software in June 08 from Amazon.com. After the install I was impressed with the software capabilites. With real time views from your zip code to views from other parts of space. It makes finding the constellations easier than I could have ever imagined and bring up specific galaxies, stars, novas, comets and a whole host of other bodies with a simple check. After a couple of hours of playing it became very user freindly. However, I run it on a 2005 Sony VAIO with XP, 120 GB hard drive, over 1 GB of RAM and standard processor. I plan to hook it up to my Orion telescope and test the other abilities. Again, it works great in XP.

Great purchase....Has everything that you could possibly need. The Only problem is vista compatibility. The disc i have says its compatible with vista but it did not seem to work well with vista. It works amazing with XP. I would recommend that you run starry night on windows xp(service Pack 2 ) compatibilty mode(If you are using vista). Once you do that, it works great. Its a little slow but it works!

Enjoy!....Definitely a good purchase

I have had this product for some time, running fine under XP 32 bit. Sometimes it didn't play well with certain graphics adapters like Nvidia GE-Force 6800. However, once I upgrade to Windows 7 64 bit, this program will not install. Checking their website, it also doesn't appear they support the product any longer. Shame too, because it was the most full featured desktop planetarium software I've seen in some time.

I've been using it for about 10 days. There is a LOT of information packed in there, and there is a bit of a learning curve as you how to access various functions. Being able to navigate between celestial objects and create maps for guiding yourself among the stars is excellent. As I don't have an autoguiding scope I can't comment on the integration of StarryNight but I have read from the forums that its pretty good. One issue at present is that the latest version of Quicktime is NOT compatible with the latest version of StarryNight. You need to downgrade Quicktime to 7.3- preferably before installing Starry Night or various things won't work. Support from the company is excellent and I strongly recommend you join the Yahoo Starry Night Moderated group.

This is absolutely a beautiful program--when it works. In fact on XP I would give it four stars. The problem is it won't run under many machines loaded with Vista. The company, on their Yahoo group site, makes many recommendations for getting it to work, but it still wouldn't for me on two different laptops. One gave me screwed up graphics and the other an ominous memory dump message.

The real problem, I think, is that the program was originally for Macs and they were able to adapt it for Windows 98 & XP, but Vista is a whole different kettle of fish. It has been almost a year since their site said they would have a Vista compatible version "soon." I think they removed that message now. Also Amazon should remove the claim that it's runs on the Vista platform.

I'm afraid that Imaginova is a long way off from becoming truly Vista compatible. I recommend looking at SkyMap Pro or SkyTools at skyhound.com.