I Want The Wireless Technology The Rovers Have

[Ed Hansberry]

<a href="http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/4202901/">http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/4202901/</a><br /><br />"NASA upgraded the bandwidth connection to its pokey twin Mars rovers, a boost that will allow scientists to send and receive data like pictures more quickly, a mission manager said Friday. The rate is now <i><b>nearly five times the speed of home dial-up Internet connections</b></i>."<br /><br />These things are roughly 48,000,000 miles from here (73,000,000 km) and they are talking at ~265kpbs! 8O I can't get much better than 28kpbs with my GPRS connection. Forget cell phones. If NASA can do this with devices on Mars, I say turn the wireless technology on Earth over to them. They gave us Velcro, Teflon and pens that write upside down, they can give us ubiquitous fast wireless technology too!<br /><br /><img src="http://www.pocketpcthoughts.com/images/hansberry/2004/20040204-marswireless.gif" /><br /><br />I found the above image on a site about the wireless technology in the rovers, but I suspect it is a fake. Yes, it has the annoying bluetooth flashing light, but I just don't think bluetooth has the range. Although, the whole flash memory problem a few weeks ago with Spirit may have been a coverup. Maybe Spirit just wasn't bonding properly.

[arnage2]

28k, lucky! nextel gives me 9.6k. Thats why wifi is so much fun.

[jkendrick]

"NASA released wireless technology for the PocketPC Platform. The CF Type III card is available on the NASA website.

Download size: 256kb
Prices: $2,000,000,000





:D

[arnage2]

you forgot to mention tang. Nasa gave us tang. :mrgreen:

[Dave Potter]

When he said the Rovers - I thought he meant that old Irish band - you know the one with all those drinkin' songs :lol:

"Wasn't that a party"
:lol: :lol:

[Jonathon Watkins]

When he said the Rovers - I thought he meant that old Irish band -

Nah - he's talking about the British car company. :wink:

[Icebaron]

Here's a little nitpick... the space pen was actually created by a private company. (Fisher, as you might have guessed by the name Fisher space pen). Nasa never contacted Fischer and asked them to create the pen, rather Paul Fisher, a big fan of the space program, developed the pen with his own money because he felt that wood pencils with easily broken graphite posed a safety hazard in space. The first 400 space pens were sold to NASA for like three bucks a piece, in the mid 60s, and Fisher never got directly reimbursed for the money he spent developing the pen, although I'd be willing to be that the commercial success of the pen eventually made up for the lost cash in the near 40 years it's been sold.

[ricksfiona]

Sure they may be able to speak with the Rovers at that distance at 256kbs, but the power needed to transmit the distance must be astronomical.

BTW, I get 56kps on my T-Mobile GPRS service :D

[daS]

These things are roughly 48,000,000 miles from here (73,000,000 km) and they are talking at ~265kpbs! 8O I can't get much better than 28kpbs with my GPRS connection. Forget cell phones. If NASA can do this with devices on Mars, I say turn the wireless technology on Earth over to them. They gave us Velcro, Teflon and pens that write upside down, they can give us ubiquitous fast wireless technology too!
I know you were only joking about this Ed, but for those that believe that there is some amazing new wireless technology NASA is using...

The impressive bandwidth is certainly not ubiquitous, but rather it's highly directional. The Rovers are using very focused antenna and NASA is using huge dishes also focused on a fixed target. (Okay, so the rovers are moving around on another planet - which itself is moving around in the sky, but you get the idea.)

We already have consumer wireless WAN technology that can easily exceed what NASA is using in the form of EDGE and EvDO. The problem isn't one of technology, but rather one of cost. Just imagine what kind of speed Verizon or T-Mobile could offer you if they only had to support two customers per planet. :lol:

[Dave Potter]

...Just imagine what kind of speed Verizon or T-Mobile could offer you if they only had to support two customers per planet. :lol:

Per planet? Are Verizon and T-Mobile offering services on planets other than earth now?

:lol:

[that_kid]

Can you ping me now.......Good :D

[johncj]

The bandwidth may be impressive, but the latency sucks.

[Ed Hansberry]

...Just imagine what kind of speed Verizon or T-Mobile could offer you if they only had to support two customers per planet. :lol:

Per planet? Are Verizon and T-Mobile offering services on planets other than earth now?
Some would say cellular carriers aren't offering "service" here either. :rotfl:

[Janak Parekh]

Some would say cellular carriers aren't offering "service" here either. :rotfl:
Well, isn't it obvious? The wireless carriers are serving Martians first and foremost. 0X

--janak

[David Johnston]

C:\>ping rover1.jpl.nasa.gov

Pinging rover1.jpl.nasa.gov[137.78.160.201] with 32 bytes of data:

Request timed out.
Request timed out.
Request timed out.
Request timed out.

Ping statistics for 137.78.160.201:
Packets: Sent = 4, Received = 0, Lost = 4 (100% loss),


Damn.

[daS]

Pinging rover1.jpl.nasa.gov[137.78.160.201] with 32 bytes of data:

At first I thought you created that URL as a joke, but you showed a valid IP address, I thought I'd ping the URL myself. It resolved to: 137.78.73.146. Are we to believe that Spirit is using dymamic IP? 8O

Anyway, thanks for the laugh. :lol:

[dean_shan]

Pinging rover1.jpl.nasa.gov[137.78.160.201] with 32 bytes of data:


Where did you get that address?

[David Johnston]

Pinging rover1.jpl.nasa.gov[137.78.160.201] with 32 bytes of data:


Where did you get that address?

I pinged jpl.nasa.gov, changed the last number of the ip to 201, and appended "rover1" to the name. I never realised the rover1 address would actually resolve to anything!

But also, consider this:

C:\Documents and Settings\Dave>ping rover3.jpl.nasa.gov

Pinging rover3.jpl.nasa.gov [137.78.73.132] with 32 bytes of data:

Request timed out.
Reply from 137.78.73.132: bytes=32 time=524ms TTL=46
Reply from 137.78.73.132: bytes=32 time=353ms TTL=46
Reply from 137.78.73.132: bytes=32 time=645ms TTL=46

Ping statistics for 137.78.73.132:
Packets: Sent = 4, Received = 3, Lost = 1 (25% loss),
Approximate round trip times in milli-seconds:
Minimum = 353ms, Maximum = 645ms, Average = 507ms

8O

[ironguy]

If you think this is good, can you guess the bit rate when talking to one of the long range planetary mission satellites?

Last time I checked, they were commanding at a bit rate of 1 bit per second. Telemetry returning wasn't much different.

[ctmagnus]

A geographic tracert of this could be very interesting. ;)

Edit: Nah. Apparently it resolves to someplace in or around L.A. (http://www.sarangworld.com/TRACEROUTE/), rather than covering the billions of miles and getting the exact coordinates on Mars I had hoped for. ;)

[Janak Parekh]

A geographic tracert of this could be very interesting. ;)
Even if the rovers were connected to the public Internet, there would have to be a proxy on Earth that would do a direct-ish connection. It's not like they're going to have Cisco routers and IP routing in the satellites. Right? 8O

--janak

[ctmagnus]

True, but it would be so cool to get an image like that, particularly if it's a vector image.

"Where do you want to ping today?"

[jeffmd]

isnt it like 20 minutes lag?


C:\Documents and Settings\Dave>ping rover3.jpl.nasa.gov

Pinging rover1.jpl.nasa.gov [137.78.73.132] with 32 bytes of data:

Request timed out.
Reply from 137.78.73.132: bytes=32 time=11050ms TTL=46
Reply from 137.78.73.132: bytes=32 time=12500ms TTL=46
Reply from 137.78.73.132: bytes=32 time=12255ms TTL=46

Ping statistics for 137.78.73.132:
Packets: Sent = 4, Received = 3, Lost = 1 (25% loss),
Approximate round trip times in milli-seconds:
Minimum = 11050ms, Maximum = 12500ms, Average = 11935ms

that not bad, average planetside pings ^^

[bbarker]

The bandwidth may be impressive, but the latency sucks.
Hahahaha! Good one!