Launch Costs

Robert,

This is not a big thing really. We've flown standard
cisco routers on spacecraft on numerous missions.
Heck, the mars pathfinder mission used a basic off the
shelf modem with only a few mods on it. Chips and
memory is also easy. What you're worried about are
gamma ray bursts doing random bit flipping. This is
easy to fix with having multiple processors on-board
and using a simple voting methodology for commanding.
That is, if you have 3 processors given three same
inputs, and two of them come out iwth the same output
and the third is different, you just go with the
majority and assume that the third processor has been
compromised in some way.

The same goes with memory. Just think of a simple
software RAID array on a satellite. Not to hard to
implement. Many university class satellites are in
fact running with standard off the shelf hardware
besides just those companies that Al has already
pointed.

Accoustics and Vibe can be an issue but that is a
very easy one to fix mechanically.

Ryan

--- Robert wrote: