The factory said it was fine. When it came back, i suspected the problem was that it needed more than 12V to operate; goto mounts demand a lot while slowing across the sky
It now appears that the intermittent problems that I am seeing hs because the bundled ExploreStars app is, in the words of SuperGrok, "abandonware": software free but largely forgotten by its authors and supported like they no longer remember their child. It works but unreliable enough that few people use it.
What most owners of the mount use are ASCOM (a standard free Windows driver package) or INDI (the Linux equivalent). Planetarium programs such as Carte du Ciel and Stellarium can control the mount through the ASCOM drivers telling it where to go (ditto for KStars in Linux). So using a laptop, not a tablet or cellphone. This takes away much of the simplicity of a small tablet.
Kstars under Linux is pretty clumsy to control the mount. Setting these up under either Linux or Windows is clumsy because you are either on the Internet reading instructions or connected to the mounts server, not both. Lots of disconnecting and reconnecting. I ordered a USB WiFi adapter so that I can have both open at the same time. I have done this before in the 1980s where I set up a PC with two Ethernet cards to create a LAN analyzer, so i know it can be done.
In any case, if it turns out to be too clumsy to use for goto, it is still a nice compact mount for public astronomy.
UPDATE: I spent some time with the manual for Explore Stars (which does not match the app), some time with SuperGrok, and some analyzing what it seems to want to do. I think i have ExploreStars app figured out. I will try this tonight.
