Hi John – happy new year to you too!
I recently purchased an Ultrastar Pro – which is an upgrade to the Ultrastar. I understand that the main changes with the Pro versions are to do with the electronics; faster downloads and lower read noise. And they now come in a blue body!
The Lodestar Pro uses the same CCD as the Lodestar X2 – but that is a different CCD to the original Lodestar. Whether this chip has fewer hot pixels I could not say… You could try emailing Starlight Xpress – they are usually helpful.
Callum