They do. It's going to take several days to deploy, and then even longer to transmit the images. We'll have to be patient.
Speaking of this... the CNN coverage late last night was hilarious. The chubby talking head going on about "how long" we'll have to wait for images, and then almost complaining we might not see any tonight.
We are getting pictures... from MARS!... 17 minutes is just too long.
No kidding. Curiosity is transmitting at 32kb/s. That seems slow when compared to wifi, which is 1000x faster, but mine doesn't work on the other end of my house... they're sending a signal over 150 million miles!
No kidding. Curiosity is transmitting at 32kb/s. That seems slow when compared to wifi, which is 1000x faster, but mine doesn't work on the other end of my house... they're sending a signal over 150 million miles!
Not only is it really far, they are sending on maybe 20 watts. Compare this to a typical FM broadcast station, at 100,000 watts.
Yeah that they can pick it up at all is pretty cool.
The nuclear pile only puts out 120W or something like that too, so it's pretty power efficient (though that's 120W constantly and they probably have batteries for large loads, and they probably use the excess heat to warm the thing so no need for specific warming circuits).
__________________ Uncertainty is an uncomfortable position.
But certainty is an absurd one.
__________________ "In brightest day, in blackest night / No evil shall escape my sight / Let those who worship evil's might / Beware my power, Green Lantern's light!"
I am assuming that we have extended a warm CP welcome to our martian overlords who will surely be agitated that we are crash landing crap on thier home planet.
Anyways, this is majorly cool. I wish I worked at the jet propulsion lab, it would be cool.....
__________________
If I do not come back avenge my death
I am assuming that we have extended a warm CP welcome to our martian overlords who will surely be agitated that we are crash landing crap on thier home planet.
Anyways, this is majorly cool. I wish I worked at the jet propulsion lab, it would be cool.....
Can you imagine the noise they have to filter out to get a signal from Mars? We complain when our wireless devices turn to digital grunge or cut out, and the transceiver is 2-3 miles away, often less.
Can you imagine the noise they have to filter out to get a signal from Mars? We complain when our wireless devices turn to digital grunge or cut out, and the transceiver is 2-3 miles away, often less.
My wireless is in my basement. I can lose the signal on my back deck, if my body is between the device and the router. A signal from Mars is incredible.
I find it to be 'mind blowing' that we humans built a freaking car sized robot and flown itit flew itself through space to another planet... incredible.
Even better!
__________________ Uncertainty is an uncomfortable position.
But certainty is an absurd one.
A signal from Mars is amazing, more amazing that they are able to get back a reasonable amount of data. It would be different if a communication station was permanently set up on Mars, then it could be engineered to transmit a powerful signal and plenty of bandwidth.
I don't want to make this political, but it makes my blood boil that Obama is praising the mission, but this is his plan for the Mars funding going forward:
Quote:
In its proposed budget, the Obama administration would slash Mars program funding by more than $200 million in 2013, from $587 million to $360.8 million, before ultimately slashing it to $188.7 million in 2015
Are you ****ing kidding me? Unbelievable. NASA put a car sized craft on Mars for less than it takes most auto makers to engineer a new model of car.
In its proposed budget, the Obama administration would slash Mars program funding by more than $200 million in 2013
are you ****ing kidding me? Unbelievable. NASA put a car sized craft on Mars for less than it takes most auto makers to engineer a new model of car.
To be fair the USA is having a tough time, Curiosity is on the ground with the funding in place for the next 2 years,I'm not sure where the cuts were made but I'm sure it wont bother Curiosity's mission.
Did Obama cut out another mission or cut 200 million from useless stuff that's been done over and over like the reconnaissance orbiter?
