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Is this the satellite NASA had given up because there was no communications equipment left?

bri3d 12y ago
It sure is! I'd love to see some more technical details but according to this article: http://www.planetary.org/blogs/emily-lakdawalla/2014/02070836-isee-3.html http://www.planetary.org/blogs/emily-lakdawalla/2014/0207083... Goddard claimed that they couldn't rebuild the hardware that was used to talk to ISEE-3 at reasonable cost. The Space College project are using SDR: http://spacecollege.org/isee3/isee-3-reboot-project-status-and-schedule-for-first-contact.html http://spacecollege.org/isee3/isee-3-reboot-project-status-a... And they used their funding to buy some custom amplifier gear to send to Arecibo.
arrrg 12y ago
Funding, as always, seems to have been the issue. If NASA doesn’t have the money for it (or thinks they have better things to do with the money), they can’t do anything. The explanation of not having access to communications equipment is more about the cost of restoring that ability, not any claim that contacting the probe would in principle be impossible. The message is more or less that they don’t just have some device standing around they can flip on and sit some intern in front of it for a few hours to get this going. NASA wanted to express that substantially more effort would be required. It seems that many people (including people at NASA) are donating a lot of resources, time and money to this project. That’s why this can happen. But NASA can’t budget with the expectation of receiving donations.
- calinet6 12y ago
  "Can't" is a bit simplistic. Think of it like that old piece of software you wrote when you were young that you've since abandoned, because you know, about 20 years have passed, no one uses AppleII's anymore, 126 some odd other pieces of software that do exactly the same thing but better and faster have been released, and also mobile happened. Besides, you have a job now doing modern things for modern reasons that are actually valuable to people and the world and stuff, so really there's not even a reason to figure out how a 5 and a quarter floppy drive can possibly connect to your rMBP to have a look at the code and see if an emulator or whatever would make it run right. But if someone wants to throw $151,000 in donations at it, sure kids, have a ball. And yeah, of course we'll reminisce and have some fun with it over a beer or two. Those were the good old days, after all, when we were real rocket scientists, and space probes Farquharing around the solar system on a perfectly choreographed dance of not just one mission, but three—no, not two, three—what do you think it's doing right now? You think this kind of thing just happens by chance? Have fun—and bring her back in one piece, will ya?

bri3d 12y ago

It sure is! I'd love to see some more technical details but according to this article: http://www.planetary.org/blogs/emily-lakdawalla/2014/02070836-isee-3.html http://www.planetary.org/blogs/emily-lakdawalla/2014/0207083... Goddard claimed that they couldn't rebuild the hardware that was used to talk to ISEE-3 at reasonable cost. The Space College project are using SDR: http://spacecollege.org/isee3/isee-3-reboot-project-status-and-schedule-for-first-contact.html http://spacecollege.org/isee3/isee-3-reboot-project-status-a... And they used their funding to buy some custom amplifier gear to send to Arecibo.

arrrg 12y ago

Funding, as always, seems to have been the issue. If NASA doesn’t have the money for it (or thinks they have better things to do with the money), they can’t do anything. The explanation of not having access to communications equipment is more about the cost of restoring that ability, not any claim that contacting the probe would in principle be impossible. The message is more or less that they don’t just have some device standing around they can flip on and sit some intern in front of it for a few hours to get this going. NASA wanted to express that substantially more effort would be required. It seems that many people (including people at NASA) are donating a lot of resources, time and money to this project. That’s why this can happen. But NASA can’t budget with the expectation of receiving donations.

calinet6 12y ago
"Can't" is a bit simplistic. Think of it like that old piece of software you wrote when you were young that you've since abandoned, because you know, about 20 years have passed, no one uses AppleII's anymore, 126 some odd other pieces of software that do exactly the same thing but better and faster have been released, and also mobile happened. Besides, you have a job now doing modern things for modern reasons that are actually valuable to people and the world and stuff, so really there's not even a reason to figure out how a 5 and a quarter floppy drive can possibly connect to your rMBP to have a look at the code and see if an emulator or whatever would make it run right. But if someone wants to throw $151,000 in donations at it, sure kids, have a ball. And yeah, of course we'll reminisce and have some fun with it over a beer or two. Those were the good old days, after all, when we were real rocket scientists, and space probes Farquharing around the solar system on a perfectly choreographed dance of not just one mission, but three—no, not two, three—what do you think it's doing right now? You think this kind of thing just happens by chance? Have fun—and bring her back in one piece, will ya?