Mars Rover Has 'Amnesia' With Worn Out NAND Memory

[N.Broekhuijsen]

It seems that one of the Mars Rover Opportunity's NAND memory banks has been word out, giving the rover Amnesia.

Mars Rover Has 'Amnesia' With Worn Out NAND Memory : Read more

 

[yumri]

well over the years NAND Flash doesgo bad just good to know it is more like a decade instead of something more soon is all.
For NASA though if possiable they should retreive that robot and send a upgraded model back to Mars to continue the research into the planet of Mars.

 

[Bradford Hamilton]

what, no backups??? I backup my SSD weekly, and use TRIM as well...
: - )

 

[alextheblue]

well over the years NAND Flash doesgo bad just good to know it is more like a decade instead of something more soon is all.
For NASA though if possiable they should retreive that robot and send a upgraded model back to Mars to continue the research into the planet of Mars.

New rover, maybe. Retrieve the old rover? Bonkers.

 

[GKaya]

I don't think they have anything to pick up the Rover. Maybe send newer ones and fix/upgrade the Mars Rover there?
Could you imagine using a 10 year old (non upgraded) computer?

 

[jasonelmore]

if everyone on earth donated a dollar, we'd have enough money to build a real starship enterprise.

Advice of the day : Thx

 

[eklipz330]

the technology doesn't exist because it's not cost effective. easier to design a new one with better more modern technology than to spend billions on researching on how to get back an old one, then spending billions more upgrading it.

 

[yumri]

I don't think they have anything to pick up the Rover. Maybe send newer ones and fix/upgrade the Mars Rover there?
Could you imagine using a 10 year old (non upgraded) computer?

its more of what it has picked up and how it wears down from being on Mars than just it being 10 years old as how it wears down can tell us alot also the rocks it has picked up can tell alot too.

 

[Vorador2]

Well, Opportunity was expected to work three months, not 10 years. NASA simply didn't expect to last it enough for the SSD to fail.

 

[back_by_demand]

When they send a new rover, have a spare SSD sent along and swap out, then have both rovers going.

 

[SkyBill40]

When they send a new rover, have a spare SSD sent along and swap out, then have both rovers going.

Really? And how is that going to be done? By another rover? Get a grip.

 

[delellod123]

send a Best Buy Geek Squad to install a new hard drive. Afterward, they can charge the us govt $800 for the repair and another 8 billion for the space flight.

 

[vern72]

Ten year is not bad for flash memory but I still wouldn't trust my data with NAND without a backup.

 

[AJSB]

10 years seems a lot, but i don't think is that much....i wonder exactly how much in MB or GB data was written in that Flash and what is the capacity of each bank...*then* we can have an idea if it was that much a good performance...or not.

I also personnally don't trust my data to SSDs...i simply don't consider them reliable enough, give me a 2.5" 2TB HDD with standard z-height of 9.5mm (i.e. Samsung M9T, also sold by Seagate as an external back up that you tear appart to retrieve the Samsung M9T) and i'm happy.

 

[SkyBill40]

I also personally don't trust my data to SSDs...i simply don't consider them reliable enough...

I'm a platter drive guy, too. I don't trust SSDs seeing as they are guaranteed to wear out. A platter could last nearly forever so long as it's not been dropped or placed into a condition to enact a failure event. To me, the only thing SSDs are good for is your OS. I'm just not comfortable putting all of my potentially irreplaceable data on an SSD.

 

[George Mulligan]

It's been ten years??? God, I feel old.

 

[SkyBill40]

It's been ten years??? God, I feel old.

Here, let me help you out with your "feeling old."

You know the Bon Jovi song "Living on a Prayer"? It turns *30* this year. No joke. 30.

You're welcome.

 

[popatim]

I think its amazing that an SSD from 2003 ran for 10 years and is still going!
Cudo's to the engineers who designed this gem! May all of ours last as long also!

 

[chicofehr]

They must have used SLC chips. Most SSD from those days would not last more then a couple years I am sure. Of course stuff made by NASA isn't made in China which helps with QA.

 

[ex_bubblehead]

I think its amazing that an SSD from 2003 ran for 10 years and is still going!
Cudo's to the engineers who designed this gem! May all of ours last as long also!

Their tech is much older than that. From design to launch could be as long as 6-8 years, or more.

 

[WyomingKnott]

Bear in mind that since Mars has virtually no atmosphere and very weak magnetic fields (I've read that it's on the order of 1/1000 that of Earth's), the memory is in an environment with harsher radiation then the SSDs that we run. It was probably hardened for that, of course.

 

[yumri]

@WyomingKnott so a special harsh enviroment caseing around the soldered on static RAM chips? as NAND was not invented thus static RAM was used from what i can remember there is a MAJOR DIFFERNCE in technical details but on the consumer level we will notice nothing between them besides that static RAM is extremely costly and faster than NAND at smaller sizes about 8KB to 128KB while NAND is better for 1GB and above this is why static RAM was used for so long as it ussualy runs around 3GHz in the CPU and is very easy to change on a very frequent basis while NAND wears out quicker and runs slower but is faster at higher denstities than static RAM is thus why the rover only had 7 memory banks as static RAM is like a few hundred dollars per chip.

 

[EasyLover]

Ouccccccccchhhhhhhhhhhhhhh

This is something which should have been catered for during the design phase. Billions of dollars spent with NAND base solution. Anyhow, Let's really hope NASA gets lucky with remaining 6 banks.

 

[USAFRet]

Ouccccccccchhhhhhhhhhhhhhh

This is something which should have been catered for during the design phase. Billions of dollars spent with NAND base solution. Anyhow, Let's really hope NASA gets lucky with remaining 6 banks.

It was in the design. It's been up there for 10 years. Original design life was 90 days.

 

[USAFRet]

I'm just not comfortable putting all of my potentially irreplaceable data on an SSD.

All drives die. That's what backups are for.