Starry Night Pro Plus

Rating:
Summary: Wow!
Review: I have been an avid stargazer for 30 years and a previous happy owner of an older version of Starry Night software I bought 4 years ago. I recently bought the new 4.5 version of Pro Plus and was astounded that software I already loved so much was brought so far forward. The user interface has been substantially upgraded and I have started to put in my own photos of my favorite viewing spots near the Florida Everglades. While I was admittedly a little challenged by some of the customization instructions, I found the customer support group to be very knowledgable and responsive. Bring it on Starry Night!

Rating:
Summary: MyMac.com Product Review
Review: I love looking up at the stars, but trying to find constellations, planets, and other celestial objects has always escaped me. Except for maybe Venus and the big and little dipper, I am mostly useless at finding these objects. And I cannot tell you how many times I have looked at a bright object in the sky and said, "What is that?" So a chance to play with Starry Night Pro, self-proclaimed as "the world's most realistic astronomy software" sounded like a great opportunity.

Starry Night Pro Plus comes packed with a number of different items in the box. First was the Starry Night Pro CD that installs on both Windows and Mac computers. In addition, 2 "PlusPaks" CDs were included. PlusPak 1 adds additional Mars, Moon, and Earth high-resolution planet-surface and horizon images as well as a 16-minute mini-movie. PlusPak 2 adds 11,000 additional galaxy, nebula and star cluster images as well as 10 additional Milky Way images. Also included in the plus box was a DVD called "Atlas of the Sky" which contains more than 2 1/2 hours of original movies showing some amazing images and visualizations of astronomical objects and phenomena. An additional CD was included in box, which is also called "Atlas of the Sky" and is a multimedia CD similar to the DVD that installs as an option into the program. Additionally, 2 books are included. The first, Starry Night Companion is a 240-page guide to better understanding the night sky while using the Starry Night program, but is not a User's manual. Instead, it includes Astronomy Basics, Observational Advice, info on Earth's Celestials Cycles, and info on our solar system and deep space constellations. The other book is the 168-page User's Guide to using the program. I can see before I start that this is not going to be a trivial program to learn. Time to install the software.

Starry Night is big and has high system requirements. You will need OS 10.1 or greater to us this program, and at least 1 GB of free disk space to install. This is not a typo! If you install all the additional packs and CDs, reserve at least 2 GB! The application alone is 557 MB, and if you choose to install the multimedia movies, add an additional 600 MB of space. The PlusPaks will also require about 500 MB of additional disk space each to install as well. Installing was easy, just insert the Starry Night CD and click on the Install icon. The installer does the rest. You will need QuickTime 6.0 or later to run Starry Night, so install that if not already on your computer. After accepting the license and choosing where you want the software to install, sit back and relax for a while, as there are nearly 6000 files to be installed for the main program. This will take some time, about 10 to 15 minutes depending on your computer. If adding the PlusPacks, add another 10 to 15 minutes or longer to install each of those as well (PlusPak #2 installs nearly13,000 files!) After installing the software, you can then install the Starry Night Multimedia content as well. And although these installers ask for an install location, where they actually put the files was a mystery to me until I rebooted and noted that the StarryNight application "container" for the main application was now close to 2 GB in size. Obviously all files are installed inside the main application container, keeping the install very clean actually.

One final note, if installing version 4.5, there is a 4.5.2 update available from the StarryNight website that should be run before using this software.

While memory requirements are not spelled out, and it ran fine on my 1 GB PowerBook with 5 other programs running, but some animation was not so smooth in this mode. So, the more memory the better, and for best results, run it alone with no other apps running.

Also note that while using this on a PowerBook (or laptop) seems the most logical choice for outside star gazing, the power saving modes of the PowerBooks while running on batteries caused sporadic and jumpy animations and updates. To make things smoother while on batteries, go to the System Preferences and open the Energy Saver panel. Under "Settings for:" select "Battery Power" and then under "Processor Performance:" select "Automatic" for some improvement t. For even better performance, select "Highest" under performance but note that this will use your battery charge up considerably faster than normal, resulting in less than half your normal battery time. Do not forget to set this back to "reduced" or "automatic" when done with the program. (I would love to see Apple add a setting in Energy Saver that allows you list programs that run at a specified processor performance while running on batteries automatically.)

Rest of review at http://www.mymac.com/showarticle.php?id=1732

Rating:
Summary: Awesome tool for astronomers of any level
Review: I was first exposed to Starry Night with a "feebie" version included with my first telescope. Later I upgraded a few times and now regularly use Starry Night Pro Plus. What a fantastic tool! I can plan out my evening of star gazing, including printing out charts! A neat feature is the ability to have the program calculate the actual viewing area of my telescope with any of the eyepieces I regularly use, plus I can print them out in the correct orientation for viewing through the telescope.

On raining or cloudy nights, I can still enjoy the stars with this package. Movie clips, star patterns, DSO, planets, it's all in there with Starry Night. This software is worth every penny, and then some!

Rating:
Summary: Awesome tool for astronomers of any level
Review: I was first exposed to Starry Night with a "feebie" version included with my first telescope. Later I upgraded a few times and now regularly use Starry Night Pro Plus. What a fantastic tool! I can plan out my evening of star gazing, including printing out charts! A neat feature is the ability to have the program calculate the actual viewing area of my telescope with any of the eyepieces I regularly use, plus I can print them out in the correct orientation for viewing through the telescope.

On raining or cloudy nights, I can still enjoy the stars with this package. Movie clips, star patterns, DSO, planets, it's all in there with Starry Night. This software is worth every penny, and then some!

Rating:
Summary: Awesome tool for astronomers of any level
Review: I was first exposed to Starry Night with a "feebie" version included with my first telescope. Later I upgraded a few times and now regularly use Starry Night Pro Plus. What a fantastic tool! I can plan out my evening of star gazing, including printing out charts! A neat feature is the ability to have the program calculate the actual viewing area of my telescope with any of the eyepieces I regularly use, plus I can print them out in the correct orientation for viewing through the telescope.

On raining or cloudy nights, I can still enjoy the stars with this package. Movie clips, star patterns, DSO, planets, it's all in there with Starry Night. This software is worth every penny, and then some!

Rating:
Summary: Awesome Software!
Review: You can't go wrong with Starry Night Pro Plus. I've used 7-8 other programs, but I keep coming back. Nothing else matches the features, ease of use and power of this package. Worth many times the asking price for everything you get. You won't be disappointed!

Rating:
Summary: Awesome Software!
Review: You can't go wrong with Starry Night Pro Plus. I've used 7-8 other programs, but I keep coming back. Nothing else matches the features, ease of use and power of this package. Worth many times the asking price for everything you get. You won't be disappointed!