ZWO ASI294MC Color

Sony 4/3" BSI Sensor with 63,700e- Full Well

At the core of the ASI294MC is a large 4/3" Sony CMOS sensor with a 21.63mm diagonal, providing a generous field of view for framing the entire lunar disc or large solar prominences. The back-illuminated (BSI) architecture maximizes sensitivity by placing the sensor's wiring layer behind the photodiodes. This design, combined with a massive 63,700e- full well capacity and 1.2e read noise, yields a high dynamic range essential for capturing bright planetary limbs and faint atmospheric details in the same exposure without clipping highlights.

19 FPS Capture for High-Resolution Planetary Imaging

The ASI294MC is engineered for lucky imaging, a technique that freezes moments of steady atmospheric seeing. It streams full 11.7 MP frames at 19 FPS over its USB 3.0 port, allowing you to capture thousands of frames in a short period. This high-speed capture is critical for imaging targets like Jupiter, which rotates quickly, and ensures you have enough data to stack only the sharpest frames for a final, detail-rich image.

• USB 3.0 Interface: A 5Gbps bandwidth ensures the camera can operate at its maximum frame rate of 19 FPS without dropping frames.
• ST-4 Guide Port: While primarily an imaging camera, the onboard ST-4 port allows it to double as a high-sensitivity guide camera for a secondary imaging rig.
• Electronic Rolling Shutter: Captures data sequentially across the sensor, which is ideal for astronomical targets that do not have rapid, inconsistent motion.

The Uncooled Advantage: Simplicity and Portability

As an uncooled camera, the ASI294MC has a significant advantage in weight, power simplicity, and cost. Weighing only 0.25 lbs and requiring no external 12V power supply for cooling, it runs entirely off the USB 3.0 port. This makes it an ideal grab-and-go planetary camera that minimizes cable clutter and power management at the telescope, getting you imaging faster. The trade-off is higher thermal noise on exposures longer than a few seconds, which firmly establishes its role as a specialist for short-exposure planetary, lunar, and solar work rather than long-exposure deep-sky imaging.

ASI294MC vs. the Cooled ASI294MC Pro

The primary distinction between this camera and its sibling, the ASI294MC Pro, is thermoelectric cooling. The Pro version is built for long-exposure deep-sky astrophotography, while this uncooled model is optimized for high-speed planetary work.

• ASI294MC Pro Advantage: Regulated two-stage cooling dramatically reduces thermal noise, making it possible to take clean multi-minute exposures of faint nebulae and galaxies. It also includes a 256MB DDR3 buffer to prevent amp glow and ensure stable data transfer.
• ASI294MC (Uncooled) Advantage: Significantly lower cost and complexity. It is lighter (0.25 lbs), draws less power, and requires no separate 12V DC input, making it a more portable and straightforward solution for capturing planets, the Moon, and the Sun (with a proper solar filter).