ASI2400MC Pro (Color)

The ASI2400MC Pro is the first CMOS Astro Camera that adopts Sony IMX410 Sensor. Some of the highlights include:

• Sony IMX410 full-frame format sensor – giving a great field of view
• 14-bit ADC – giving high dynamic range
• 24 MP sensor with a pixel size of 5.94 um – large sensor and large pixels to capture amazing detail
• An incredibly large well depth of 100ke- – no need to worry about saturating stars
• Ultra-low readout noise of 1.1e- – bringing out more details in your images with improved dynamic range
• Zero amp-glow – one thing less to worry about in post-processing.

Considering the above specifications and a peak QE of around 80%, the ASI2400MC Pro is born to be another great innovation of ZWO in the field of full-frame cooled OSC astronomy cameras.

Full Frame OSC Camera

The ASI2400MC Pro uses full-frame format, the sensor length and width are 36mm x 24mm and the diagonal is 43.3mm. Currently it is only available in a one-shot-colour (OSC) version. OSC is very suitable for those just beginning with astrophotography, but considering the fantastic specifications of this camera, we are sure that many seasoned astrophotographers will take a liking to it as well. If you don’t have the time to take a lot of sub-exposures with different filters, or money to spend on accessories like filters and filter wheels, this camera will deliver amazing images!

IMX410 Backlit Sensor

Sony’s back-illuminated CMOS image sensor improves the sensitivity and noise reduction – the key factors to enhancing image quality. It does this by radically realigning the fundamental pixel structure from front-illumination to back-illumination, while still retaining the advantages of CMOS image sensors such as low power consumption and high-speed operation.

With a conventional front-illumination structure, the metal wiring and transistors on the surface of the silicon substrate that form the sensor’s light-sensitive area (photo-diode), impede photon-gathering carried out by the on-chip lens. A back-illuminated structure minimizes the degradation of sensitivity to the optical angle response, while also increasing the amount of light that enters each pixel due to the lack of obstacles such as metal wiring and transistors. These components have been moved to the back-side of the silicon substrate.

Camera Performance

Large well depth capacity, low read-out noise and high dynamic range.

As an example of the improvements made in the ASI2400MC Pro, a comparison with the full frame ASI-camera ASI128MC shows that the full well capacity of the ASI2400MC Pro is a whopping 132% that of the ASI128MC (even though they have a very similar pixel size of 5.94um vs 5.96um). The ASI2400MC Pro comes with ultra-high a dynamic range of up to 14 stops that will greatly reduce the issue of overexposed images and also help to collect richer color information.

When the gain value is set to 140, the HCG high gain mode is turned on. We’re not saying it’s magic…but we’d like to think it is pretty close. With the HCG-mode turned on, the readout noise is greatly reduced (as low as 1.1e), and the dynamic range is basically unchanged.

Zero Amp Glow

Traditional CMOS sensors produce a weak infrared light source during operation quite often seen in the corner of uncalibrated images as the tell-tale signs of ‘amp glow’. As the ASI2400MC Pro uses zero amp glow circuitry, you won’t have to worry about amp glow even when using high gain, long exposure imaging.

Anti-Dew

ASI2400MC Pro comes with a polyimide heater that can avoid any dew problems.

The anti-dew heater sits on top of the protective window and will heat it to avoid any dew problems.

The heat anti-dew heater power is around 5W and can be turn off using software in order to save power.

Two-Stage TEC Cooling: Ultra-Low Dark Current

Thanks to the two stage TEC cooling, ASI2400MC Pro can lower the CMOS sensor temperature to more than 35 degrees Celsius below ambient temperature, which can greatly reduce dark current generation and sensor noise even during extended exposure times.

*The Delta T 35℃ is tested at 30℃ ambient temperature. It might get down when the cooling system is working for a long time. Also, as the ambient temperature falls, the Delta T would also decrease. 

The unique dark current suppression technology can further reduce dark current noise. When it’s cooled to -20℃, the current noise can be as low as 0.00035e/s/pix, which is completely negligible!

Please notice that the camera needs to be connected to an external 11-14v power supply to implement the cooling function. We recommend you use 12V@3A DC adapter (5.5*2.1mm, center pole positive) or lithium battery with 11-14V to power the camera.

USB3.0 & 256M DDR3 Memory

The ASI2400MC Pro is equipped with a USB 3.0 transmission interface and a built-in 256MB (2Gb) DDR3 cache to ensure stable and secure data transmission. During long exposures, it effectively avoids frame dropping and greatly reduces the glow effect caused by slow reading speed.

ASI Cooled Cameras produced after August 2023 have changed their DDR3 buffer from 256MB to 512MB.