floofloofVoyager 1 loses contact with NASA, turns on retro transmitter not used since 1981
Always have a backup. You may not use it for 43 years, but you’ll be glad it’s there when you do.
I’m only 41 years old.
This recievier has been working for my whole life, goes out of service 15 billion miles away, turns on a backup reciever, and is now back in contact with NASA.
…but the ice cream machine at McDonalds is still broken.
I’m picturing the Voyager 1 terminal is an ancient computer from the 1970s hooked up to a large parabolic antenna, and everyone is afraid to upgrade it because they might mess something up. I’m sure that’s not the case, but its what lives in my mind.
Since I was thinking about it I looked up some stuff: “So Voyager-1 does not “really” have a computer, in the sense that it does not have an operating system or RAM or a microprocessor. It was built in the 60s before any of this was invented and used CMOS-based microcontroller chips from Texas Instruments. Overall, it has a 16-bit processor and a MASSIVE memory of 70 KILOBYTES. That is smaller memory than a thumbnail of a phone image today, but it was enough to send images through which we discovered Jupiter has rings and much more.”
It’s probably not too far off. The ground station probably uses the same antenna, the computer running it is probably relatively new, but I’m sure there’s some kind of emulation for the control software. Like a Fortran emulator, not like WINE or an old DOS VM.