Celestron SkyScout Personal Planetarium
The SkyScout is a revolutionary handheld device that uses advanced GPS technology with point and click convenience to identify thousands of stars, planets, constellations and more.
Simply point the SkyScout at any star in the sky and click the “target” button.
The SkyScout will tell you what object you are looking at.
To locate a star or planet, select the object’s name from the menu and follow the directional arrows through the viewfinder.
SkyScout tells you when you are on target. It’s that easy!
So I know it has GPS, but how does it know what part of the sky you are pointing at? It must sense RA/dec somehow, but how?
N9IWP
May 18, 2006, 5:41pm
2
Well, it can get the time from GPS.
Brian
Is that something that might be found on a $400 device? (I really don’t know.)
astro
May 18, 2006, 5:56pm
4
How does it work
Sky Scout combines GPS technology, which gives the time, date and location of the user, software that calculates the position of the objects for that moment and 3 axis sensors measuring gravitational and magnetic fields to determine the true orientation of the SkyScout to the earth. Operates on 2 user supplied double A batteries.
How does it work? - SkyScout FAQ
The SkyScout uses a patented technology that combines 3 main components:
GPS receiver: collects information from GPS satellites to get the exact time, date, and location
Coordinate Database: database has celestial coordinates for all 6,000 objects
Gravity & Directional sensors: tell the unit the angle and orientation it is being used at.
Once the unit knows the time, date, location, and the orientation it is being held at, it can instantly find the object using the known coordinates of the sky objects
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Well, yeah, I sorta guessed it had sensors of some kind. I was just curious about the technology.