Hi Mark,

Um. Quite odd indeed...

A couple of things to try:

Check the 'Invert Images' box in the DSS/RealSky Images dialog. It could
be that the images are coming in with bad contrast settings, and therefore
are appearing totally black. Invert them, and they'll be totally white...
which may not seem much of an improvement, but (a) it'll let you know that
you _are_ getting the images; and (b) you can then right-click on a corner
of the image, then on "OK", then adjust the contrast.

Try going to Alpha Centauri at a suitably small field of view (say,
a few arcminutes) and asking for a POSS-1 blue image. This should cause
your browser to start up with an error message, telling you that there
is no POSS-1 image for this part of the sky. (For the excellent reason
that Alpha Centauri is below Palomar Observatory's horizon, and can
never be imaged, not even in X-rays.)

If that works, we can at least assume that Guide is in contact with
the image server, and work from there.

-- Bill