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Re: Temperature Calibration

David J Taylor GM8ARV 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁳󠁣󠁴󠁿 🇪🇺
 

True in one sense. I wasn't sure how you were linking the
calibration data to the stuff you push out to the video drivers.

I have tried to keep the images to a known, standard calibration.
GOES mode-A (dog-leg) seemed a reasonable choice.

I guess I was
thinking of Geosatsignal where it's possible to drop in an IR
channel,
select false colour and still get the same temperature readout. I
wouldn't personally mind 'unlinking' the video data from the
calibrated
data if that were possible, unless, or even because one day a
colour
option becomes available, as I don't think the grey-scale gives
meaningful, quantifiable, reapeatable, readout. With for example,
Timestep's WEFAX animations you could add up to 8 colours, with
selectable ranges so that you could for example distinguish at a
glance
cold air over the continent advecting westwards with fair accuracy.

Just a thought for the future perhaps!!
You can already do all of this with GeoSatSignal, using colour
lookup tables defined in temperature (e.g. from -60C to +39C) rather
than arbitrary values, or using the standard GOES lookup curves.
Have a play with making your own CLUTs!

Cheers,
David
Re: Temperature Calibration

James Brown <james@...>
 

In message <bl4dnc+m8sg@eGroups.com>, David Taylor <david-taylor@blueyonder.co.uk> writes
--- In MSG-1@yahoogroups.com, James Brown <james@m...> wrote:
Ah got it now - can't have histogram selected at the same time!
.. because that makes any grey level to temperature mapping
completely arbitrary!

Cheers,
David
True in one sense. I wasn't sure how you were linking the calibration data to the stuff you push out to the video drivers. I guess I was thinking of Geosatsignal where it's possible to drop in an IR channel, select false colour and still get the same temperature readout. I wouldn't personally mind 'unlinking' the video data from the calibrated data if that were possible, unless, or even because one day a colour option becomes available, as I don't think the grey-scale gives meaningful, quantifiable, reapeatable, readout. With for example, Timestep's WEFAX animations you could add up to 8 colours, with selectable ranges so that you could for example distinguish at a glance cold air over the continent advecting westwards with fair accuracy.

Just a thought for the future perhaps!!

Thanks David.
--
James Brown
Re: Temperature Calibration

David J Taylor GM8ARV 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁳󠁣󠁴󠁿 🇪🇺
 

--- In MSG-1@yahoogroups.com, James Brown <james@m...> wrote:
Ah got it now - can't have histogram selected at the same time!
.. because that makes any grey level to temperature mapping
completely arbitrary!

Cheers,
David
Re: Solar outages to be expected on MSG-1 next weeks

Alan Sewards <alan.sewards@...>
 

As usual, Arne has given a detailed and factual account of what happens
during a solar transit. However, there are millions of TV dishes out there
which suffer these insults on an annual basis, and I have never seen or
heard of any problems, so I suspect that the gloomy prognostications of
possible damage are rather pessimistic. Yes, you will lose some signal (as
you will on your Sky service or any other satellite TV) for a few minutes,
but I very much doubt that any damage will be suffered by the LNB. You are
far more likely to injure yourself, cause damage or lose signal by messing
around with the dish trying to avoid the problem!

If it ain't broke, don't fix it!

Best regards - Alan

----- Original Message -----
From: "Arne van Belle" <a.van.belle@hccnet.nl>
To: <MSG-1@yahoogroups.com>
Sent: Saturday, September 27, 2003 1:20 PM
Subject: [MSG-1] Solar outages to be expected on MSG-1 next weeks


Solar outages to be expected on MSG-1 in Spring and Autumn:

Twice a year, in the spring and the fall the sun passes across the equator
directly behind each geo-stationary satellite in the Clark belt. When the
main beam of our Hotbird dish is in direct line of sight with the sun, a
sun outage occurs. The LNB is bombarded by the sun's RF radiation focussed
by the dish. This causes a drastic deterioration of the receive C/N
(carrier to noise ratio). Basically, the satellite signal is overwhelmed
by
the unwanted signal from the sun; the signal from the sun is what we call
noise. This phenomenon is also known as Sun transit or Solar Interference.
Solar outages only affect downlinks (receivers), not uplinks
(transmitters). They also occur in cloudy weather, as the RF radiated by
the sun is only dampened slightly by clouds.
A solar outage will effectively cause about 10 minutes loss of signal from
that satellite. On the days before and after when the sun is directly
aligned with that satellite there will be less outage. The actual days and
times depend on your latitude and longitude, longitudinal position of the
satellite, diameter of the dish and the received frequency. The larger the
dish diameter and higher the frequency, the shorter time and the fewer
days
sun outages last.

Can it damage my system?
Modern LNB's can handle the high levels of RF noise (using moderate sized
dishes). But during a solar outage all visible sunrays will be focused on
your LNB. Normally a LNB can cope with this, but in exceptional cases (a
wet, shiny dish surface and bright, sunny weather), the plastic cap
covering your LNB can burst!

Can I prevent this?
You cannot block the RF noise from the sun without blocking the signal
from
Hotbird, so everyone will experience loss of signal during a solar outage.
But you can block the visible sunrays by putting a non-transparent plastic
bag over the LNB or dish without blocking Hotbird's signal. Alternatively
you could swing the dish out of position during a sun outage to prevent
damage to the LNB.

When will I be affected?
To calculate the date and time of solar outages you need to know your
latitude and longitude, the longitudinal position of the satellite, the
receive frequency and the diameter of your dish.
David Taylor has extended WXtrack to calculate solar outages (registration
required). Use version 3.4.0.705 or newer and go to View, Solar outage...
Check the default values already entered, and then go to the "Outage List"
tab.

For my location in the Netherlands, solar outages in Fall 2003 for Hotbird
6 are predicted for October 7 to 15, between 10:41 and 10:55 UTC with a
peak outage on October 11.
Receive systems for Meteosat 5/6/7, GOES, GMS (1691 MHz band) will be
affected too.

For a full explanation look at:
http://www.geo-orbit.org/sizepgs/Noise.html
and http://www.david-taylor.myby.co.uk/wxsat/atovs/solar-outages.htm

Arne van Belle
Co-ordinator Radio Observers
Werkgroep Kunstmanen
N51.774 E4.612

Thanks to David Taylor for extending his WXtrack and editorial work on
this
article.




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Re: Temperature Calibration

James Brown <james@...>
 

Ah got it now - can't have histogram selected at the same time!

Cheers,

James

--
James Brown
Re: Temperature Calibration

James Brown <james@...>
 

In message <bl47c6+m3s5@eGroups.com>, David Taylor <david-taylor@blueyonder.co.uk> writes
One initial comment - I still can't get Data Manager to call up a
readme file when that option is selected in the help menu - am I
alone?

Works here. Ensure that the file MsgDataManager.txt resides in the
same folder as MsgDataManager.exe. It should have been placed there
by the full Install of V1.2.0.
Did a re-install and the readme file comes up fine now - thanks.

1. Does this refer to viewing files still in DataManager? because
if so I can't get it to function.

It applies only to the Detailed Image tab, the zoomed-in view.
OK I can select the detailed image tab with lat and long showing with the mouse, but no temp readout on channel 9 even though calibration is ticked in the advanced set-up box. Can I try anything else David?

Snipped the rest for the time being.

James
--
James Brown
Re: Temperature Calibration

David J Taylor GM8ARV 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁳󠁣󠁴󠁿 🇪🇺
 

One initial comment - I still can't get Data Manager to call up a
readme file when that option is selected in the help menu - am I
alone?

Works here. Ensure that the file MsgDataManager.txt resides in the
same folder as MsgDataManager.exe. It should have been placed there
by the full Install of V1.2.0.


But my main query is something I've been meaning to check on for a
while. In the readme file update we get:
[]
Add GMS-5 temperature display on CTRL + mouse move

1. Does this refer to viewing files still in DataManager? because
if so I can't get it to function.

It applies only to the Detailed Image tab, the zoomed-in view.

2. Does it imply that temperature readout should be available for
all the thermal channels?

This is a moot point! If you have enabled the temperature
calibration for HRIT channels 4..11 then it should work. It does
here. You use the Advanced... button on the setup tab to enable the
calibration, but be aware that it will change the brightness and
contrast of the images in an animation sequence. I do not recommend
enabling calibration for channel 4 (mid-IR) which I find better left
as a hot-spot detector. GOES-9 data is calibrated according to the
published curves for GMS.

http://weather.is.kochi-u.ac.jp/sat/CAL/

GOES-10 and GOES-12 is supposed to be calibrated as if it were GVAR,
but doing that appears to give the wrong values. I have queried
this with Eumetsat, and would welcome discussion with anyone else on
the topic.

http://www.oso.noaa.gov/goes/goes-calibration/gvar-conversion.htm

3. Or does it only refer to opening up Gesosatsignal?
No

Hope that helps.
David
Temperature Calibration

James Brown <james@...>
 

One initial comment - I still can't get Data Manager to call up a readme file when that option is selected in the help menu - am I alone?

But my main query is something I've been meaning to check on for a while. In the readme file update we get:

V1.2.2 2003 Sep 22 Improve clarity of boundary overlay on detailed image
Add GMS-5 temperature display on CTRL + mouse move

1. Does this refer to viewing files still in DataManager? because if so I can't get it to function.

2. Does it imply that temperature readout should be available for all the thermal channels?

3. Or does it only refer to opening up Gesosatsignal?

Incidentally has there ever been a more chaotic state to the atmosphere around the UK as today?

Cheers,

James







In message <000901c384d5$5ed34370$0100a8c0@douglas>, Douglas Deans <douglas@dsdeans.freeserve.co.uk> writes


----- Original Message -----
From: "James Brown" <james@meteosat.freeserve.co.uk>
To: <MSG-1@yahoogroups.com>
Sent: Saturday, September 27, 2003 9:23 AM
Subject: Re: [MSG-1] Re: Equipment for receiving MSG-1


Now, why would you want to run Geosatsignal (as well as MDM) - what is it
and
what does it do?
Did you REALLY mean you are unaware of Geosatsignal John? Or are you
only subscribed to the MSG list? I thought everyone on the list knew of
this brilliant programme! I am amazed - but be prepared to be amazed
yourself. Full colour animations using three of the MSG channels,
overlays of Bracknell charts, temperature calibration read out, zoom in
and out, the list goes on...

I think David might let you have a trial license if you want to dip your
toe in.

Cheers,

James
--
James Brown

I agree with every word.
For general use of GeoSatSignal see part 2 of my recent article in RIG
Journal 70, P82 and for some specific comments relating to its use with MSG
see my article about to come out in RIG 74 with lots of images courtesy of
GeoSatSignal 4.

Regards
Douglas.




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MSG-1-unsubscribe@yahoogroups.com



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--
James Brown
Re: Equipment for receiving MSG-1

a_van_belle
 

Thanks David, James and Douglas for replying,

To take full benefit of the MSG-1 data is quite a challenge, for both hardware and operator.
We all started with the basics, receiving and decoding.
But once you have seen these wonderful, Full colour, remapped, full day, MSG-1 animations you want them too!

Greetings,
Arne van Belle
Solar outages to be expected on MSG-1 next weeks

a_van_belle
 

Solar outages to be expected on MSG-1 in Spring and Autumn:

Twice a year, in the spring and the fall the sun passes across the equator
directly behind each geo-stationary satellite in the Clark belt. When the
main beam of our Hotbird dish is in direct line of sight with the sun, a
sun outage occurs. The LNB is bombarded by the sun's RF radiation focussed
by the dish. This causes a drastic deterioration of the receive C/N
(carrier to noise ratio). Basically, the satellite signal is overwhelmed by
the unwanted signal from the sun; the signal from the sun is what we call
noise. This phenomenon is also known as Sun transit or Solar Interference.
Solar outages only affect downlinks (receivers), not uplinks
(transmitters). They also occur in cloudy weather, as the RF radiated by
the sun is only dampened slightly by clouds.
A solar outage will effectively cause about 10 minutes loss of signal from
that satellite. On the days before and after when the sun is directly
aligned with that satellite there will be less outage. The actual days and
times depend on your latitude and longitude, longitudinal position of the
satellite, diameter of the dish and the received frequency. The larger the
dish diameter and higher the frequency, the shorter time and the fewer days
sun outages last.

Can it damage my system?
Modern LNB's can handle the high levels of RF noise (using moderate sized
dishes). But during a solar outage all visible sunrays will be focused on
your LNB. Normally a LNB can cope with this, but in exceptional cases (a
wet, shiny dish surface and bright, sunny weather), the plastic cap
covering your LNB can burst!

Can I prevent this?
You cannot block the RF noise from the sun without blocking the signal from
Hotbird, so everyone will experience loss of signal during a solar outage.
But you can block the visible sunrays by putting a non-transparent plastic
bag over the LNB or dish without blocking Hotbird's signal. Alternatively
you could swing the dish out of position during a sun outage to prevent
damage to the LNB.

When will I be affected?
To calculate the date and time of solar outages you need to know your
latitude and longitude, the longitudinal position of the satellite, the
receive frequency and the diameter of your dish.
David Taylor has extended WXtrack to calculate solar outages (registration
required). Use version 3.4.0.705 or newer and go to View, Solar outage...
Check the default values already entered, and then go to the "Outage List"
tab.

For my location in the Netherlands, solar outages in Fall 2003 for Hotbird
6 are predicted for October 7 to 15, between 10:41 and 10:55 UTC with a
peak outage on October 11.
Receive systems for Meteosat 5/6/7, GOES, GMS (1691 MHz band) will be
affected too.

For a full explanation look at: http://www.geo-orbit.org/sizepgs/Noise.html
and http://www.david-taylor.myby.co.uk/wxsat/atovs/solar-outages.htm

Arne van Belle
Co-ordinator Radio Observers
Werkgroep Kunstmanen
N51.774 E4.612

Thanks to David Taylor for extending his WXtrack and editorial work on this
article.
Re: 'Overheating' SkyStar 2 cards.

M5WJF <m5wjf.qthr@...>
 

Hi All,

I've not had any overheating of the Skystar 2 Card whilst installed
on an AMD Athlon XP 2200+, and on my system I had every PCI Slot
filled, indeed I had a Win TV BT878 Decoder one side of it and a PCI
2x Serial the other side without problems.

I must admit to having four case fans, two fans on a Ti4400 AGP
Card, and one fan attached to the board chipset, in addition to the
normal CPU & PSU fans. Maybe a lesson here?

At the moment I've transferred the Skystar to an AMD Athlon 1.2GHz,
with only three slots populated, this will be a stand alone receiver
PC, no overheating observed as yet, but there is a case fan.

73 de Wayne M5WJF
Re: Equipment for receiving MSG-1

Douglas Deans <douglas@...>
 

----- Original Message -----
From: "James Brown" <james@meteosat.freeserve.co.uk>
To: <MSG-1@yahoogroups.com>
Sent: Saturday, September 27, 2003 9:23 AM
Subject: Re: [MSG-1] Re: Equipment for receiving MSG-1


Now, why would you want to run Geosatsignal (as well as MDM) - what is it
and
what does it do?
Did you REALLY mean you are unaware of Geosatsignal John? Or are you
only subscribed to the MSG list? I thought everyone on the list knew of
this brilliant programme! I am amazed - but be prepared to be amazed
yourself. Full colour animations using three of the MSG channels,
overlays of Bracknell charts, temperature calibration read out, zoom in
and out, the list goes on...

I think David might let you have a trial license if you want to dip your
toe in.

Cheers,

James
--
James Brown

I agree with every word.
For general use of GeoSatSignal see part 2 of my recent article in RIG
Journal 70, P82 and for some specific comments relating to its use with MSG
see my article about to come out in RIG 74 with lots of images courtesy of
GeoSatSignal 4.

Regards
Douglas.
Re: Equipment for receiving MSG-1

James Brown <james@...>
 

Now, why would you want to run Geosatsignal (as well as MDM) - what is it and
what does it do?
Did you REALLY mean you are unaware of Geosatsignal John? Or are you only subscribed to the MSG list? I thought everyone on the list knew of this brilliant programme! I am amazed - but be prepared to be amazed yourself. Full colour animations using three of the MSG channels, overlays of Bracknell charts, temperature calibration read out, zoom in and out, the list goes on...

I think David might let you have a trial license if you want to dip your toe in.

Cheers,

James
--
James Brown
Re: 'Overheating' SkyStar 2 cards.

John Parkins <john@...>
 

Hello john,

Sorry somehow managed to post this to the rig-l group first time
round.......


Well Technisat want to make their minds up.

"3. Now you have to choose a free PCI slot. If possible choose the PCI slot with
the designation ￜ0ￜ. (first PCI slot). So you make sure, that the board first will
be checked for functionality. Then place the SkyStar PCI in. Unscrew the
slotï¿œs metal dust protector located on the back cover of the case. Lay the
protector on the ground to one side."

I quote from Technisat own installation instructions, slot "0" being
the one next to the AGP slot........

So not always best to follow the instructions to the letter.


Friday, September 26, 2003, 7:42:00 PM, you wrote:

jac> All,

jac> I have taken this matter up with TechniSat who are not aware of any 'problem'
jac> or
jac> duff cards (my words).

jac> They say if you install your SkyStar card next to your graphics card then
jac> over
jac> heating is likely.
jac> They recommend a spare slot between the Skystar card and any other card.
jac> And say ' Nowadays an additional cooler for PCs with high loaded PCI cards is
jac> recommended.'

jac> Regards,
jac> John Tellick.


--
Best regards,
John mailto:kvp@bigfoot.com
Re: Equipment for receiving MSG-1

David J Taylor GM8ARV 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁳󠁣󠁴󠁿 🇪🇺
 

Now, why would you want to run Geosatsignal (as well as MDM) -
what is it and
what does it do?

I believe David's MDM now handles animation.
Are you saying that MDM's animation will cause problems with data
reception?

The MSG Data Manager handles animation with helper programs. There
is a choice of two optional add-on programs:

- MSG Animator - monochrome only real-time animations of selected
regions of the full-disk images. MSG-1 specific, and integrated
with the MSG Data Manager to achieve real-time operation.

- GeoSatSignal - false-colour, multi-channel processing from any
geostationary satellite, including remapping to standard map
projections (polar stereo, Mercator etc.), land-sea colour lookup
tables, and weather chart overlay. Not MSG-1 specific.

Do you (anyone) need to store 20,000 files of raw data?
MSG-1 produces about 15000 files per day, so if you want to
reprocess the data at all, that's what you need as your daily
storage requirement.

It seems from what Arne says that even the most powerful computer
today can loose segments if you make it do enough extra work. Using
a Pentium III 550MHz for receive-only, I have seen missing segments
with only slight extra loading. Even running Internet Explorer can
cause problems. On the other hand, running a disk defrag seems OK.
(Defrag does not use the TCP/IP stack whereas Internet Explorer
does. The DVB software uses TCP/IP internally. Co-incidence?).

As Dave says, there is nothing to prevent people starting with a
single-PC system, and migrating to two PCs in the future is that's
required. But adding Eumetcast reception and MSG-1 processing and
animation to a heavily loaded existing PC with too little memory is
not something I would advise anyone to do!

Cheers,
David
Re: Equipment for receiving MSG-1

Timestep <Information@...>
 

From: Dave Cawley
Timestep Dartmouth England
e-mail Information@Time-step.com
Web site http://www.Time-step.com
Tel. +44 (0)1803 833366
Fax. +44 (0)1803 839498

John

I don't know what your quest is here. Sam and I both run animation on a
single computer, and we could run several computers if we wanted to. We
choose to use one computer.

John, could it be, that you are still not receiving MSG at all ? In which
case why don't you telephone Sam or me, or even fellow RIG committee member
Mark Clark for some one to one assistance ?

Regards

Dave
Re: 'Overheating' SkyStar 2 cards.

Alan Sewards <alan.sewards@...>
 

I had occasion recently to switch my SkyStar card from one machine to
another. It had been running continuously for several weeks when I turned
off the machine and removed it. It was warm, but not hot, i.e. there were no
objects on it one could not touch. I have known video cards much warmer than
it was. So my card does not have an overheating problem. I did and do have
spare slots between the card and other cards - in fact, I put the SkyStar
card in a slot near the bottom as I felt that a cold wall next to it would
be helpful.

Regards - Alan

----- Original Message -----
From: <johnrigsec@aol.com>
To: <MSG-1@yahoogroups.com>; <rig-l@yahoogroups.com>
Sent: Friday, September 26, 2003 8:42 PM
Subject: [MSG-1] 'Overheating' SkyStar 2 cards.


All,

I have taken this matter up with TechniSat who are not aware of any
'problem'
or
duff cards (my words).

They say if you install your SkyStar card next to your graphics card then
over
heating is likely.
They recommend a spare slot between the Skystar card and any other card.
And say ' Nowadays an additional cooler for PCs with high loaded PCI cards
is
recommended.'

Regards,
John Tellick.






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MSG-1-unsubscribe@yahoogroups.com



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Re: Equipment for receiving MSG-1

Timestep <Information@...>
 

From: Dave Cawley
Timestep Dartmouth England
e-mail Information@Time-step.com
Web site http://www.Time-step.com
Tel. +44 (0)1803 833366
Fax. +44 (0)1803 839498

John

This is good as I hope 'we' will be able to point future users as to
the sort
of system <<<

We don't need to point users. They can start on a single computer, if they
like it, then fine. If not then two. Let them experience life.........

I chose one computer, John, what is your set up ?

Dave
Re: Equipment for receiving MSG-1

johnrigsec@...
 

In a message dated 22-09-03 20:50:27 GMT Daylight Time, a.van.belle@hccnet.nl
writes:

But running Geosatsignal and animation additionally is too heavy for
the amount of memory and causes loss of missing segments, even on my
intel P4 2.4 GHz with 1024 Mb DDR memory running Windows 2000 SP3.
Hi Arne,

Thanks for more useful information and advice.

Now, why would you want to run Geosatsignal (as well as MDM) - what is it and
what does it do?

I believe David's MDM now handles animation.
Are you saying that MDM's animation will cause problems with data reception?

Do you (anyone) need to store 20,000 files of raw data?

A lot to learn.

Best wishes,
John.
Re: MSG equipment survey.

johnrigsec@...
 

All,

Once again many thanks to the many users who have responded and please
forgive me that I have not got around to thanking everyone individually.

There are some interesting and I think useful bits of information coming to
light
and I'm quite surprised at the number of users using 2 computers.

Dave Cawley and Arne reminded me that memory speed is rather important in
the system - which I'd not asked for.
Also Dave felt FSB was important.

If you are receiving EUMETCast and have not responded to the survey - a
description of the reception equipment and computer/s you are using would
be helpful to get an overall picture.

Please e-mail me directly, rather than clutter up the user groups.
johnrigsec@aol.com

Regards,
John Tellick.
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