Of course those computers were purchased on a government contract <bg>
>CPU - single core, 20MHz clock
>RAM - 128MB
>Storage - 256MB solid-state flash memory
>
>Useless for business, even a child's LeapPad has a lot more power than that.
>
>But, the
Opportunity Mars Exploration Rover is run by a computer like that. The embedded world is
very different from the business computers we use every day.
>
>BTW the radiation-hardened RAD6000 computers on those rovers (and some other spacecraft) are US$200,000+ each.
>
>The
Curiosity Mars Science Laboratory gets a bump up to a 200MHz RAD750 computer (actually a redundant pair). Luckily the supplier has been able to roughly hold the line on unit price :)
>
>
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comparison_of_embedded_computer_systems_on_board_the_Mars_rovers>
>
Curiosity swaps out the dusty solar panels for a plutonium-powered RTG. It's scheduled to land August 6. Start your countdowns now...
Charles Hankey
Though a good deal is too strange to be believed, nothing is too strange to have happened.
- Thomas Hardy
Half the harm that is done in this world is due to people who want to feel important. They don't mean to do harm-- but the harm does not interest them. Or they do not see it, or they justify it because they are absorbed in the endless struggle to think well of themselves.
-- T. S. Eliot
Democracy is two wolves and a sheep voting on what to have for lunch.
Liberty is a well-armed sheep contesting the vote.
- Ben Franklin
Pardon him, Theodotus. He is a barbarian, and thinks that the customs of his tribe and island are the laws of nature.
