KStars
KStars is an open source desktop planetarium for KDE.
It depicts an accurate simulation of the night sky, including stars, constellations, star clusters, nebulae, galaxies, all 8 planets, the Sun, the Moon, comets and asteroids. You can see the sky as it appears from any location on Earth, on any date.
The user interface is highly intuitive and flexible. The display can be panned and zoomed with the mouse, and you can easily identify objects and track their motion across the sky. KStars includes many powerful features, yet the interface is clean and simple and fun to use.
KStars can use more than 1 of a multi-core CPU. But there’s no support for OpenGL (there used to be an experimental version but it was removed).
Out of all the programs, I’m least familiar with KStars. It seems to work fine on the AK41, but my testing has been fairly limited. Let us know in the Comments below how it runs on small-form factor PCs like the AK41.
Next page: Page 5 – AstroImageJ
Pages in this article:
Page 1 – Introduction / Celestia
Page 2 – Stellarium
Page 3 – Skychart
Page 4 – KStars
Page 5 – AstroImageJ
Page 6 – Summary
Complete list of articles in this series:
| AWOW AK41 Mini PC | |
|---|---|
| Week 11 | Video consoles: SNES emulation |
| Week 10 | Running TeamViewer with AWOW AK41 as the host |
| Week 9 | Astronomy on the AK41 including Celestia, Stellarium, Skychart, and more |
| Week 8 | Recording video with OBS Studio |
| Week 7 | Home computer emulators: FS-UAE, ZEsaurUX, Hatari, Clock Signal |
| Week 6 | Web browsing with Chrome, Firefox, Opera, and Vivaldi |
| Week 5 | Gaming: SuperTuxKart, AwesomeNauts, Retrocycles, Robocraft, DOTA 2, and more |
| Week 4 | Run multiple operating systems on the AK41 |
| Week 3 | Video and audio playback looking at hardware acceleration |
| Week 2 | Benchmarking the AK41 with 3 other low power machines |
| Week 1 | Introduction to the series including wiping Windows and installing Manjaro |
This blog is written on the AWOW AK41 Mini PC.
How much does the AK41 cost?
The Mini PC retails at $239.99 / £239.99
Hi Luke,
I have bought the AWOW AK41 but I cannot find the button to start the BIOS.
Do you know which button is the right one?
In addtion I’m looking for the handbook. Do you have an idea where I can get it?
Press the Delete or Escape key to access the BIOS.
There is the very brief quick guide, there is no ‘handbook’.