From: <sandy@vbbn.com>

Date: June 17, 2005 5:30:31 PM MDT

To: Astro_IIDC@yahoogroups.com

Subject: Birthday G5

Hi Milton,

Sherry surprised me with a fully tricked out 17" iMac.

To take advantage of your AltaVec (vic?) code, I plan to save for a 'last-of-the-Mohicans' G4 laptop in a year or so to be able to run one of the FireWire cameras like the flea or such depending on the situation then.

Boy do I wish Pt. G or someone would do the work make a FireWire camera that uses an interlaced Sony EXview CCD like the one in the Mintron 12V1 with a 12 bit analog front end and an appropriate buffer to assemble the video frame.  I really want the sensitivity ...

I am working up to making, over the next year or two, a specialized 12" or 15" f/3 DOB with Stellar CAT tracking and a CCD at prime focus. It will be a video only scope for occultations of the faint ones and, if cameras become available, pure digital recording.

Sandy