Stellarium

stellarium changes computer's system time

Asked by Ion

Using ver. 0.10.2, the time in stellarium from initial startup increments faster than real time.
After exiting stellarium and checking my computer's system time I find my system time has been advanced to correspond with the advance of time in stellarium.

Will this be fixed in the next version of stellarium?
If not, stellarium is grossly inaccurate and just provides interesting pictures.

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Bogdan Marinov
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Revision history for this message
Bogdan Marinov (daggerstab) said : 		#1

Is that an attempt at extortion or something? :)

Revision history for this message
Bogdan Marinov (daggerstab) said : 		#2

This is not a common problem.

Please provide more details about your computer, starting with your operating system. I think that your motherboard model should be also necessary in this case.

Also, please describe what exactly happens and the minimal amount of steps necessary to reproduce it.

Revision history for this message
Ion (mezon) said : 		#3

1st reply answer:
No extortion intended, just a statement of fact.

2nd reply answer:
a) Windows XP sp3 + IE 8 fully updated
b) ATI Radeon 9800 Pro with 8.3 drivers (recently updated to 9.11, but stellarium not installed/tried with new drivers)
c) ABIT IC7-MAX3 with 4GB OCZ RAM & Intel Pentium IV 2.8 GHZ - all normal speed - not overclocked.

I've installed, evaluated, then uninstalled Stellarium versions 0.9.1, 0.10.1, & 0.10.2 - all with the same result:

Evaluation method;
1) Prior to executing Stellarium, I set my system clock to the NIST time source with "0" ms error.
Without executing Stellarium my system "clock" drifts about 2 seconds/day.
2) On execution of all Stellarium versions, the Stellarium time immediately starts incrementing faster than real time (approximately 1 minute fast every 5 minutes - for about a 20% increase)
3) Selecting Stellarium time controls to "normal" time or system time does not cure the problem.
4) On exiting Stellarium (after say 5 minutes) my sytem clock reads 1 minute fast and has to be reset.

I've been struggling with this off and on for over a year now, left some unanswered bug reports on the forum, and noticed a couple of bug reports which seem to have the same problem.

Thanks, I think you're right, this is a problem unique to my computer's configuration (and a few other folk) - that's the trouble with PC applications, there's millions of different configurations.

Revision history for this message
Best Bogdan Marinov (daggerstab) said : 		#4

I think I've found the root cause of your problem:
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/821893

Your motherboard supports ACPI and it probably is enabled by default:
http://www.abit.com.tw/page/en/motherboard/motherboard_detail.php?pMODEL_NAME=IC7-MAX3&fMTYPE=Socket%20478&pPRODINFO=Specifications&fSEARCHTEXT=IC7-MAX3

The bad news: if this is the case, there may be no way to fix this in Stellarium. It doesn't use the Windows API directly. Instead, it is based on the Qt framework, and Qt's Windows version in turn is based on MinGW. Microsoft's suggested solution may need to be applied on some of these lower levels.

I don't know if Fabien Chéreau (Stellarium's lead developer) has the time and/or inclination to find out if the problem is fixable in Stellarium. I can try to track it, but I don't have much free time right now. I will have more after the 20th of February.

I will file a bug report to make things more organised.

Revision history for this message
Ion (mezon) said : 		#5

wow! That was fast!

 I couldn't figure out what was wrong in over a year (off & on) and you did in less than a day.
I'll try turning off ACPI (if possible) and see what happens.

Thanks Bogdan.

Revision history for this message
Ion (mezon) said : 		#6

Hi,

Some more data points if it helps:
1) re: the Halxxxx.dll files in Microsoft's Article 821893 (The system clock
may run fast..."), my computer doesn't have any of these installed, only
acpi.sys.
2) I can't turn off ACPI in my BIOS, but I reset the BIOS (reloaded
defaults) and minimized ACPI.
3) Installed and ran 0.10.2 - still have the fast clock.

Thanks,
John

-----Original Message-----
From: <email address hidden> [mailto:<email address hidden>] On Behalf Of
Bogdan Marinov
Sent: Friday, January 29, 2010 12:51 AM
To: <email address hidden>
Subject: Re: [Question #99000]: stellarium changes computer's system time

Your question #99000 on Stellarium changed:
https://answers.launchpad.net/stellarium/+question/99000

    Status: Open => Answered

Bogdan Marinov proposed the following answer:
I think I've found the root cause of your problem:
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/821893

Your motherboard supports ACPI and it probably is enabled by default:
http://www.abit.com.tw/page/en/motherboard/motherboard_detail.php?pMODEL_NAM
E=IC7-MAX3&fMTYPE=Socket%20478&pPRODINFO=Specifications&fSEARCHTEXT=IC7-MAX3

The bad news: if this is the case, there may be no way to fix this in
Stellarium. It doesn't use the Windows API directly. Instead, it is based on
the Qt framework, and Qt's Windows version in turn is based on MinGW.
Microsoft's suggested solution may need to be applied on some of these lower
levels.

I don't know if Fabien Chéreau (Stellarium's lead developer) has the time
and/or inclination to find out if the problem is fixable in Stellarium. I
can try to track it, but I don't have much free time right now. I will have
more after the 20th of February.

I will file a bug report to make things more organised.

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