3 ms·

> Our connectivity to mars is on the order of 12kbps It depends on the spacecraft. DSN is currently talking with the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter at 1 Mbit/s (h

> Our connectivity to mars is on the order of 12kbps It depends on the spacecraft. DSN is currently talking with the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter at 1 Mbit/s (https://eyes.nasa.gov/dsn/dsn.html https://eyes.nasa.gov/dsn/dsn.html, select MRO, click "more detail" in the bottom-left).

standardly 3y ago
Wow, >46 minutes latency. IDK what I expected.
- vorticalbox 3y ago
  It's not bad seeing as Mars is 225 million to 401 million Km away depending on where it is in its orbit.
  - rtkwe 3y ago
    46 Light Minutes is pretty much the maximum, that's 827,427,184 Kilometers round trip which is a bit beyond the maximum distance to Mars so there's some processing delays thrown in there.
- squigaviator 3y ago
  We can't really get rid of the latency but we can increase the bandwidth by throwing a bunch of higher-power communication satellites on Mars.
  - falcolas 3y ago
    We can certainly push more data from Mars, but the entire point of the article is that we probably won't have the bandwidth to receive it. Unless we can convince congress and NASA execs to increase the budget and get more dishes built pronto.
    - squigaviator 3y ago
      Yep. We could cover Mar's sky with something similar to SpaceX's Starlink (high availability from any location on Mars) but with large data buffers and transmission systems that can pump the goods all the back to Earth.
      - Dylan16807 3y ago
        Three geostationary satellites should do fine for the number of data consumers on Mars.
        midasuni 3y ago
        Except for anything at the pole. But the problem remains the link from Mars to earth, not from the surface to orbit.
        sam_bristow 3y ago
        s/geostationary/areostationary
        Dylan16807 3y ago
        Nah I don't want to. "Geo" is used generically often enough and I'd rather use a generic term than a mars-specific term.
- AdamJacobMuller 3y ago
  NAME Voyager 2 RANGE 20.00 billion km ROUND-TRIP LIGHT TIME 1.54 days DATA RATE 160.0 b/sec Amazing.

standardly 3y ago

Wow, >46 minutes latency. IDK what I expected.

vorticalbox 3y ago
It's not bad seeing as Mars is 225 million to 401 million Km away depending on where it is in its orbit.
- rtkwe 3y ago
  46 Light Minutes is pretty much the maximum, that's 827,427,184 Kilometers round trip which is a bit beyond the maximum distance to Mars so there's some processing delays thrown in there.
squigaviator 3y ago
We can't really get rid of the latency but we can increase the bandwidth by throwing a bunch of higher-power communication satellites on Mars.
- falcolas 3y ago
  We can certainly push more data from Mars, but the entire point of the article is that we probably won't have the bandwidth to receive it. Unless we can convince congress and NASA execs to increase the budget and get more dishes built pronto.
  - squigaviator 3y ago
    Yep. We could cover Mar's sky with something similar to SpaceX's Starlink (high availability from any location on Mars) but with large data buffers and transmission systems that can pump the goods all the back to Earth.
    - Dylan16807 3y ago
      Three geostationary satellites should do fine for the number of data consumers on Mars.
      - midasuni 3y ago
        Except for anything at the pole. But the problem remains the link from Mars to earth, not from the surface to orbit.
      - sam_bristow 3y ago
        s/geostationary/areostationary
        Dylan16807 3y ago
        Nah I don't want to. "Geo" is used generically often enough and I'd rather use a generic term than a mars-specific term.
AdamJacobMuller 3y ago
NAME Voyager 2 RANGE 20.00 billion km ROUND-TRIP LIGHT TIME 1.54 days DATA RATE 160.0 b/sec Amazing.