"Current" top astrophotography CCD cameras

I don't know what's the best review site.  What I do know is that since 2020, the word "top" and the word "CCD" do not co-exist in the same sentence.  CCD is so 20th century.  Now we move to CMOS.

If you're looking for a modern CMOS camera with a shutter, you can fast track your research to Moravian's offerings.

I wouldn't hesitate to recommend ZWO cameras (ASI2600MM or the full-frame ASI6200MM), but you may not want to get sucked into the ZWO ecosystem.

Having said that, I am very happy in that ecosystem, and if other parts of your system also need upgrading, then it is not a bad direction to go.

Whatever you decide, I wish you all the best with your growing family!

CS Brian

"Top Camera" can mean either the most popular or the best--and those aren't necessarily the same thing.  ZWO makes some very nice cameras that fall into the category of "most popular" CMOS cameras.  They work pretty well and they are cheap, which makes them popular.   Their high-end ASI6200 camera is a good camera but it doesn't offer very many operating modes for running the IMX455 sensor and it comes with the "consumer grade" sensor (rather than the industrial grade sensor).  If you want to step up from ZWO, the QHY600 is at the next level up.  You can read about many of the differences between the QHY and ZWO cameras here:  https://astrograph.net/How-To-Guides/QHY600M-Why.   QHY is a step up but in my opinion, QHY still does not reach the level of quality that FLI used to have.  I have two QHY600s and they perform well.  Unfortunately one of them is dying and trying to get QHY to address the problem was like pulling teeth.  That story is still ongoing but in my view, customer service is a factor in picking a vendor--and in rating the camera.

If you want the best camera, I agree with Bill Long that Moravian cameras have to be considered.  I hear VERY good things about Moravian from the folks at Obstech in Chile and I have one on order.  I am told that they are well built, super reliable, and have great performance.  Moravian may be the successor to FLI but until I've had a chance to run one for a few years, I'll withhold making such a sweeping declaration.  

The ultimate problem with your question is that you didn't specify what you want to do with the camera.  My personal "top camera" for guiding is the old ZWO1600.  It is uncooled, it has a big sensor that's a good match to my ONAG guider, it is very small, and it's cheap.  At the high-end of main imaging cameras, my top pick might be one with an IMX411 sensor like the Moravian C5A-150M, but in that case, you can't care about bandwidth.  Each image file is over 300MB!  That's why I have a Moravian C1x61000 on order.  I suppose that the fact that I've committed around $6,500 to trying it out must mean that it's my current top pick!  Since I'm still waiting for it to be delivered, I can't fill in the blanks about how good I think it actually is so stay tuned.

John

John Hayes:
"Top Camera" can mean either the most popular or the best--and those aren't necessarily the same thing.  ZWO makes some very nice cameras that fall into the category of "most popular" CMOS cameras.  They work pretty well and they are cheap, which makes them popular.   Their high-end ASI6200 camera is a good camera but it doesn't offer very many operating modes for running the IMX455 sensor and it comes with the "consumer grade" sensor (rather than the industrial grade sensor).  If you want to step up from ZWO, the QHY600 is at the next level up.  You can read about many of the differences between the QHY and ZWO cameras here:  https://astrograph.net/How-To-Guides/QHY600M-Why.   QHY is a step up but in my opinion, QHY still does not reach the level of quality that FLI used to have.  I have two QHY600s and they perform well.  Unfortunately one of them is dying and trying to get QHY to address the problem was like pulling teeth.  That story is still ongoing but in my view, customer service is a factor in picking a vendor--and in rating the camera.

If you want the best camera, I agree with Bill Long that Moravian cameras have to be considered.  I hear VERY good things about Moravian from the folks at Obstech in Chile and I have one on order.  I am told that they are well built, super reliable, and have great performance.  Moravian may be the successor to FLI but until I've had a chance to run one for a few years, I'll withhold making such a sweeping declaration.  

The ultimate problem with your question is that you didn't specify what you want to do with the camera.  My personal "top camera" for guiding is the old ZWO1600.  It is uncooled, it has a big sensor that's a good match to my ONAG guider, it is very small, and it's cheap.  At the high-end of main imaging cameras, my top pick might be one with an IMX411 sensor like the Moravian C5A-150M, but in that case, you can't care about bandwidth.  Each image file is over 300MB!  That's why I have a Moravian C1x61000 on order.  I suppose that the fact that I've committed around $6,500 to trying it out must mean that it's my current top pick!  Since I'm still waiting for it to be delivered, I can't fill in the blanks about how good I think it actually is so stay tuned.

John

Good points here John. I have chatted with a number of European Astrophotographers over the years, and one thing they tend to repeat to me fairly often, is why Moravian cameras are not more popular in the US. It may have something to do with support, I am not quite sure though. When designing the CDK14 system for deployment to Ed's Remote imaging site in New Mexico, I knew a shutter was going to be a hard requirement for me. I was debating deploying the FLI PL16803 camera I already have with the scope, then I was pointed to the Moravian C5-100, which is a great value for such a large (55mm) chip. It was also usable with the 50x50 square filters I already have -- thus why it ended up at the top of the list (and on order). The C5-150 would of course be really nice, but getting new filters was not something I wanted to do from a budget perspective.

I have used both the ASI6200 and QHY600 cameras, and out of the two I had a better experience with the QHY600. I plan to use two of them for my systems remaining at home. I think they fit that use case pretty well, and if one of them dies and needs support -- at least my remote system is not impacted and troubleshooting a camera in your hand, is always easier than troubleshooting one miles away.

I think the modes on the QHY600 are pretty neat and allow for one to dial in the camera pretty nicely. This is not on the C5 from what I can tell from the site, which I will miss, but other factors of the C5 design will help cover that. 

-Bill

His images are great, but it’s his skills that overcome the disadvantage of CCD.


I also use CCD cameras. However, if I am going to buy a new camera, I will never consider the CCD one.

You can equipment search on Astrobin and look at images from scopes and cameras and check how they frame. Don’t know if this is your exact scope. 
https://app.astrobin.com/equipment/explorer/telescope/4136/explore-scientific-ed127-127mm-f75-carbon-fiber

Geoff:

Wei-Hao Wang:
His images are great, but it’s his skills that overcome the disadvantage of CCD.


I also use CCD cameras. However, if I am going to buy a new camera, I will never consider the CCD one.

I agree. I wouldn’t buy another ccd either

While I generally agree, I want to point out that the 16803 is still a superb camera—even though it’s a CCD.  In fact, the IOTD today was taken with a 16803 based camera.  They aren’t made any more but if you can find one on the used market, they are a really good match for many imaging systems that can handle a large sensor.

- John

CCD is 'dead', move on to cmos if you want to buy new astro cameras. Simple decision. This is the opinion who is still the user of two CCDs at his own observatory. 

Yuexiao

I'm also one who uses the ES127ED APO with an IMX571-chipped camera (QHY 268M+FW). With the ES 3" FF/FR, this combination yields an image scale of 1.16"/pixel, right in the sweet spot. When I first started using this camera in early 2022, I was getting egg-shaped stars in the corner of all my images.  However, using NINA's Aberration Inspector plugin, I measured the tilt and curvature of the critical focus zone and was able to flatten the field enough to get round stars into the corners of the APS-C sensor. This required only a small adjustment to the camera's built-in tilt adjuster, and spacers to extend the back focus aft of the FF/FR from 55 to 67.5mm. The cost to get a flat field with reasonably good stars was trivial: about $4 for some stainless steel machine screws (the spacers came with the camera).

You mentioned you have a young family so presumably have significant financial priorities outside the hobby, but if you are thinking about a replacement for your SBIG, I would add one more vote for the APS-C CMOS mono option.

Yuexiao Shen:
CCD is 'dead', move on to cmos if you want to buy new astro cameras. Simple decision. This is the opinion who is still the user of two CCDs at his own observatory. 

Yuexiao

*** Type your reply here **


lol it’s not dead yet buddy

Jaspal Chadha:

Yuexiao Shen:
CCD is 'dead', move on to cmos if you want to buy new astro cameras. Simple decision. This is the opinion who is still the user of two CCDs at his own observatory. 

Yuexiao

*** Type your reply here **


lol it’s not dead yet buddy

They are certainly "dead" in the sense that if you buy a CCD today over a CMOS you are almost certainly reducing the quality of your images before you even see stars. If you already have one on a scope, it will work just fine. But you should consider planning to replace it soon.

As I've said before, on the market CMOS astronomy cameras available to amateurs today are objectively superior to amateur CCDs . You will get better quality data for each minute of exposure from a CMOS, period.

You don't even need to care about specs at all. Just buy a whatever brand camera has a 571/455 sensor and slap it on your scope. Done, you now have the best.