back to article NASA, start your torrents: 622 Mbps broadband link FOUND ON MOON

NASA has successfully tested a broadband communications system built into its Lunar Atmosphere and Dust Environment Explorer (LADEE) probe, firing data to and from the Moon at rates of up to 622Mbps. LADEE, launched last month (to the detriment of an unfortunate amphibian), houses a number of instruments designed to measure …

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  1. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Typical!

    Would you believe it, the Moon gets superfast broadband before I do.

    1. TelcoPhil

      Re: Typical!

      Laser Communications Demonstration (LLCD) - a technology test flying on NASA's Lunar Atmosphere and Dust Environment Explorer spacecraft

  2. Anonymous Coward
    Paris Hilton

    Now our Mars missions can look forward to on-demand 3D porn!!

    I think the number of volunteers for that one-way mission just went up one hundredfold.

    (Paris--because now she's going to be one of the first humans to Mars!!)

    1. Cryo

      Re: Now our Mars missions can look forward to on-demand 3D porn!!

      Depending on the alignment of the planets, the ping time to Mars and back ranges between roughly 10 and 40 minutes at the speed of light, averaging around 30, so that wouldn't make for a particularly comfortable web browsing experience. Sure, you might be able to download a Blu-ray in 5 minutes, but you'll be waiting far longer than that for the video to start. "On-demand" will typically mean waiting half an hour from when you click play to when the stream starts on your end. Plus, you'll undoubtedly be sharing the connection with a bunch of filthy Mars-men, so expect your share of the bandwidth to be a fraction of that. Of course, there would likely be a colony-side datacenter that would continually download and cache videos, web sites and so on, but if you want anything that's not cached, expect to wait quite a while for it. And that's assuming whoever's in charge even lets you have a say in what gets downloaded.

  3. i like crisps
    Facepalm

    Oh yeah.....

    ...I'd totally forgotten about the frog.

  4. Gene Cash Silver badge

    "send back petabytes of information about our neighbors in the Solar System"

    Where it'll sit on tapes ignored for 46 years... http://www.moonviews.com/

  5. mIRCat
    Pint

    Avoiding long distance charges?

    Is it too late to get Voyager back to retrofit it's communication systems?

    1. cortland

      Re: Avoiding long distance charges?

      No, it's not too late.

      Assemblying the lorry and making the trip may take some time.

    2. My Alter Ego

      Re: Avoiding long distance charges?

      Nope, but Randal's done the sums on it:

      xkcd what-if - Voyager

  6. norman

    Repost from 1990s?

    Isn't this old news; a free space laser used for fiber channel or Ethernet comm?

    /between some non-existent satellites?

    1. Steve the Cynic

      Re: Repost from 1990s?

      I first ran across this idea at the Zurich Stock Exchange in about 1996, maybe early 1997. They had 155Mbps ATM fibre running under the street between the main Exchange and the back rooms. As a backup(*) they had a laser/receiver pair on the roof of each building.

      (*) Yes, they had a backup that was less reliable than the main connection. Free-air laser links are prone to not working well when it is foggy (so the fog scatters the laser). Pigeons that happen to fly through the laser path will cause the loss of signal for a small fraction of a second, but apparently fog is the real villain here.

  7. Gene Cash Silver badge

    FYI

    Really good writeup on all the bits'n'pieces here

    http://www.spaceflight101.com/ladee-lunar-laser-communication-demonstration.html

  8. Steve Knox
    Joke

    Ow My Eye!

    I'm never gonna look up at the moon again!

  9. Tromos
    Joke

    Up to 622MBPS

    Fair usage applies. Speed may be throttled if more than 5Gb/month downloaded.

  10. SRS0001

    NASA shot the moon with a laser? What if it falls on us?

    1. MrDamage Silver badge

      Dont Panic

      They had their bitchin' laser set to stun.

      www.youtube.com/watch?v=DRmWkSbEMp4

  11. Graham Marsden
    Coat

    But what happens...

    ... if we suddenly find out that "That's no moon" and it start shooting back at us...?

  12. stucs201

    Great bandwidth...

    ...terrible ping time.

  13. ian 22

    In the cloud? Meh.

    My data is stored on the MOON!

  14. cortland

    Too bad!

    No more listening in.

    http://www.arrl.org/eavesdropping-on-apollo-11

    1. qwertyuiop
      Coat

      Re: Too bad!

      This shows that absolutely no expense was spared in faking the moon landings. Film and pictures of the landings are the obvious thing to do, but imagine thinking up an obscure little piece of corroboration like this just to add credence to the fraud!

  15. Kevin 6
    Coat

    Well...

    We all know this is being funded by the NSA to spy on the moon inhabitants

    I'll get my coat

  16. jai

    OMG !!!

    Where's the Tick when you need him?!?

    http://youtu.be/7LJfwRxozmQ

  17. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    That's no moon

    It's a base station.

    So is it half duplex (with, say, radio return) or is this so-called 'Moon' now shooting lasers at us?

  18. GitMeMyShootinIrons

    Lunatic Gamers

    Finally, the secret space Nazis hidden on the moon can do some online gaming..... Oh no, the latency! Back to the backgammon board....

  19. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    nice little earner

    NASA could earn some extra cash using the link to send a packet of your best data to the moon and back - you get the packet back, together with a traceroute type log of the journey and a digital certificate of authenticity. Beats that chav geostationary data, hands down.

  20. Robert Grant

    622Mpbs

    Nice headline. Did you also ask this question: Is 100 mpbs Good For A Broadband Speed?

  21. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Latency

    It may be fast, but a round trip is going to take several (~3-4)seconds. Forget taking your Xbox for online games.

    1. Loyal Commenter Silver badge

      Re: Latency

      So, similar to ping times on Talk-Talk then?

    2. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Latency

      Turn based RPGs should make a big comeback.

  22. TheOldGuy

    But.....

    "LLCD is the first step on our roadmap toward building the next generation of space communication capability,"

    So, we're going to be using lasers in space, but SETI thinks aliens will be using radio. Have I missed something here?

  23. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Unfair government competition!

    Clearly the major carriers like AT&T, Verizon, TWC and Comcast should be out in force protesting this outrageous example of unfair government competition with private business! NASA should wait for one of these fine enterprises to establish relay stations in Lunar orbit rather than jumping in itself and interfering with our market based telecommunications economy! After all, private concerns have already proved they can put this sort of infrastructure anywhere in the universe: Didn't SpaceX deliver many needed tins of spam to the ISS? Haven't we all heard about the excellent broadband service received by the citizens of Wilson, NC? Hasn't anyone ever heard of "Lego Man in Space"? OK, so that stellar communications service enjoyed by people in Wilson is actually owned and operated by the city, and Lego Man in Space was a project by two Canadian high school students. I'm just saying.

  24. skerns0301

    The ability to send data is huge--but our ability to receive it is pretty limited--with radio the rate is slower--but we have huge dishes to receive it when it gets here (and radio and laser travel at the same speed)--there would be no practical way to justify the weight involved in sending a laser powerful enough to overcome the small size of our receivers--but for close by I'm sure it will be useful--but it will never go to Pluto.

    Stan

  25. GotThumbs

    Pandora and IHeart Radio's ears just perked up.

    Who will be the first to stream music to the moon?

    No matter there is no one there just yet. Web Surfing/checking email while on SpaceX flights from Europe to to Canada.

    Actually pretty cool

  26. cortland

    NASA? WHAT about NSA and "Big Data"; Google? Amazon, Walmart ...

    It's the ultimate Cloud; servers on the MOON can't be seized.

  27. RealBigAl

    Oh sure. They advertise speeds of UP TO 622MBPS but once you get contention based Clangers the actual throughput falls into the soup. (dragon)

  28. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    I can picture in the future, high security prisons on the moon with HDTV.

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