Advice on Next Upgrade

ASIAIR in my opinion is not an upgrade, you loose quite a bit, particularly if you’re using NINA already. If you want to do an upgrade here, get yourself a decent minipc, something like a Mele and use remote desktop.

What’s mainly holding you back now is the mount for sure. I’d keep an eye out for a good deal on an EQ6 personally. I have reasons to dislike harmonics, but I cannot argue their portability if that is a goal however. The EQ6, while not as portable is more reliable and forgiving. It’s also very underrated in terms of performance.

I’d also really consider a move to mono at some point, especially if you deal with any light pollution. The efficiency will improve your workflow.

A good mount and a good imaging train will increase your flexibility in the long run. Your choice of telescopes will not be as limited. As for pixinsight, you are right in saying it is the gold standard. It’s a very good investment, however I know Siril can create perfectly acceptable results if you don’t want to ugprade right away.

Not an experienced astrophotographer, but I’ll give you my 2 cents.

I’m having great fun with the 533MC on top of the RASA 6”, with an Antlia Triband II filter to combat the lovely light pollution I have in my neck of the woods.

I reckon if you live under less shit conditions, you could go RGB with that and enjoy the Universe in true color. The RASA is fast enough you don’t have to worry about losing efficiency by shooting OSC, which you are already doing anyway.

That thing sits on top of an AM3N and is all piloted by an ASIAir +, with a ZWO EAF, so I’m pretty much sitting inside the ZWO bubble (the guide scope is the ZWO 30/5 and the guide camera is an ASI178MM, retired from planetary work). This is a great and light setup, so if you want to travel to some mountain pass and don’t want to spend 45’ setting things up for the night, this is great.

I agree that ZWO’s app is quite shit, especially compared to NINA, but you won’t need a laptop, just your mobile phone/tablet, and you can sit and sleep in your car while the setup does the hard work. It’s a compromise.

It depends on what you want to achieve

If you want something comparable to NINA in portable, laptop-less form, I hear wonders from people installing NINA in some mini PC and doing just the same.

I am allergic to Windows, so no NINA for me. I would happily use a Stellarmate Pro, which also covers all the power needs you may have, so that is one less piece of equipment to add to the clutter (a power distribution hub). I have the first iteration of the Stellarmate, which didn’t have the included power hub, and that has been a bit of a pain in the arse. But that was almost 8 years ago, and things have changed a lot.

I hope this helps a bit, but before you make any decisions, I reckon you should clarify to yourself what you want to photograph.

Small galaxies and planetary nebulae? Large emission/reflection nebulae?

Unfortunately, no single setup can cover all of them, especially with your small-ish sensor.

Clear skies!

One nice thing is the EQ6 is a bit cheaper then the AM5….

You could get an SII/OIII filter and depending on the target get the color benefits if you’re willing to learn and put up with the processing.

This to go hand in hand with PixInsight.

Pixinsight

Mount (Future Proof)

MiniPC

I was in a similar situation and switching to Pixinsight and a harmonic mount (from SW GTi) made a huge difference for me.

I own both ASIAIR and a minipc. The mini pc gives you more flexibility compared to the ASIAIR. The ASIAIR will lock you in the ecosystem.

Dante Hunter · Mar 26, 2026, 02:10 PM

Hi AstroBin community. I am an amateur astrophotographer looking for some advice as to what I should upgrade next. My current setup is:

• ZWO ASI533MC Pro

• William Optics New ZenithStar 61 II

• William Optics New ZenithStar FLAT 61A

• Optolong L-Ultimate

• EQM-35 Pro

• Guiding:

  • William Optics Slide-Base UniGuide 32mm Scope

  • ZWO ASI224MC

• Jackery Explorer 300

Some possible upgrades I’ve been considering include:

• New telescope (Sky-Watcher Quattro 150P), which would need a new mount, most likely

• New mount (is it worth upgrading to a harmonic mount, especially if I want to upgrade to a heavier telescope like a Quattro 150P?)

• ASIAIR (I currently use NINA and my laptop, but I’ve heard great things about ASIAIR and the convenience it brings)

• PixInsight (I currently use Siril, but PixInsight seems to be the gold standard for astronomy imaging editing)

Thanks again for the advice. Looking forward to learning from your experience!

Clear skies,

Dante

In my view, your next upgrade really depends on where you are in this wonderful journey of AP.

How long have you been in the hobby, and have you used your WO 61 refractor enough and gained the experience to go deeper with longer FL etc?

If that is the case, and you feel saturated with the widefield targets and short FLs your WO 61 offered, and wish to explore larger aperture scopes or longer FLs, my first upgrade would be a sturdy mount.

I second the good advice you received above, and go for an EQ6 level mount. Almost everyone I know started getting into serious AP with that mount. I personally started with an AZ-EQ6 Pro mount, and still consider it my best AP purchase. Very sturdy, built like a tank and guides very, very well.

Harmonic mounts are all the craze these days, and you can pick up a used EQ6, AZ-EQ6 or an Ioptron CEM60 or CEM45 for quite cheap.

Harmonic mounts offer the advantage of portability, as my recommendations are much heavier and better suited if you have a place to setup and forget your mount. Frankly, I am not sold on harmonic mounts that much. I believe a good quality equatorial mount is a better long term purchase. Harmonic mounts still have the issue of PE. There must be a reason why Astrophysics and 10Micron have not made any harmonic mounts, yet, anyways.

Just be minded that guiding with your WO 61 is far more forgiving compared to going with longer focal length telescopes, and your mount will need to much more accurate.

You already have a very good OSC camera, and an excellent dual narrowband filter.

I have a gen 1 ASIAIR that never left its box, as I bought it on a whim, suffering FOMO, but after getting used to NINA, and a mini PC attached to my telescopes, using remote desktop, I felt no need for the ASIAIR at all.

I generally never rely on WiFi for any AP I do. I trust ethernet much more, and did not fancy running my imaging session suing an ipad standing out in the cold beside my imaging rigs.

Pixinsight is the way to go, eventually. It is equally the most frustrating and wonderful piece of software I have ever used. Steep, steep learning curve, but worth it if you persevere and have some patience and take your time to learn its different processes.

I have a C8, C11 Edge HD, Esprit 100 and two 70mm refractors, one WO Star 71 and the other an Altair EDQ-R 70.

If you have a look at my profile here, you will see that 90% of my images were taken with my refractors, especially the 70mm ones. I keep going back to them for ease of use, wide field of views, forgiving guiding and sharp optics.

To summarise, you already have an excellent imaging setup. Use it to the fullest and gain maximum experience with AP, before considering going any longer with your FL.

If you feel the need to upgrade anyways, get yourself a good sturdy mount!

best of luck!

CS

Ossi