[meteorite-list] Mars Rover Spirit Restored to Health

From: Ron Baalke <baalke_at_meteoritecentral.com>
Date: Thu Apr 22 10:31:20 2004
Message-ID: <200402041836.KAA28387_at_zagami.jpl.nasa.gov>

>
> Thanks for the kind and informative answers in this and the other post, Ron ... At only 128 MB, that sounds surprisingly low ...

My mistake, the flash memory is 256MB. The rover has 128 MB of DRAM and 3 MB of
EEPROM.

>it's pretty standard on a decent digital camera nowadays (and costs $100 or less, though I guess you have to keep it warm), that many dealers are sporting in Tucson.

Actually, a compact flash card was recently released at 4 gigabytes. You have to
remember though that MER was started 3 1/2 years ago, and the hardware design is
frozen early on. It is not unusual for a planetary spacecraft to be a couple of
years or more behind the current technology. Often times, you can't use off-the-shelf
commercial hardware unless it has been space qualified.

Ron Baalkek
Received on Wed 04 Feb 2004 01:36:32 PM PST