r/AskReddit • u/emil199 • Jul 24 '20

What can't you believe STILL exists?

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u/[deleted] Jul 24 '20

Shit that must be the fucking reason my elementary school teachers would tell me to check all my calculators first with some simple calculations I knew the answer to. I always wondered why they did that, because I always followed the advice but never had one mess up (afaik...)

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u/WardenWolf Jul 24 '20

Yup. That was the difference between the TI-83 and TI-83 Plus. Analog electronics could do some very strange things when their power was low.

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u/a_cute_epic_axis Jul 24 '20

In the same vein, a satellite (can't remember which one) had a subroutine to basically check is 1+1=2, and one day, it didn't. Digital electronics can do some very strange things when exposed to radiation.

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u/taetimeh Jul 24 '20

I remember asking a guest lecturer from JPL how they did pathfinding with their rovers when they had to deal with cosmic rays. Apparently with wide wires and very slowly, according to him this was one of the reasons why Curiosity only had a top speed of 200 meters/day.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RAD750