LOL that's exactly what I thought, although I was going to go one step further and say *Starts pushing random buttons* "What do these do?" I know lol, I noticed that too! I wonder if that's the flight computer?.... I'll get my coat But seriously, I wonder if that's one of the ones they used in flight or if that's just part of the diagnostics involved in the decommissioning?
The Dell laptop is just there for diagnostic checks for whatever system to which it's connected. NASA uses Thinkpads during actual missions.
I let it pan around and was amazed at all the switches and buttons, then I clicked the up arrow...my car doesn't even have a sunroof, if I looked up and saw that I would orgasm myself to death. But what is with those seats, I have seen comfier looking Church pews.
Ah, you posted that after I edited my post and refreshed the page. I thought as much. I was pretty sure they didn't fly with Dell laptops @ Matticus: LOL @ orgasm to death The seats don't have to be comfortable, they wear so much padded clothing including their suits during launch that they don't notice the seats being hard, and there's low gravity when they're in orbit, so sitting on a hard seat up there isn't the same as sitting on a hard seat here on earth
Ah, you speak words of wisdom and logic! Makes perfect sense really, I am quite surprised I didn't realise that on my own.
Anyone else notice the Canada sticker? I love 360 photos, has anyone else seen the 40 gigapixel one of the Strahov Library.
It's amazing how a lot of the tech on board the Space Shuttle was from the 90s and still being used up till they were decommission. I remember reading several years ago in Wired were they said the most power laptop was a 166 MHz think pad. http://www.computerworld.com/s/article/9083718/Shuttle_i_Columbia_s_i_hard_drive_data_recovered_from_crash_site_
That's because we can thank Canada for just about every robotic mission on the Shuttle and ISS. Regarding the seats - it's also far cheaper to make a generic seat tray that is lightweight and easily removable if you need additional space to play. Every astronaut is different, so each one has a custom seat liner which is much cheaper to produce. It's the same method the Russians use for the Soyuz crew vehicle.
Most of the shuttle was devoloped in the early to mid 70's, and based on the bajillion switches still installed on the flight deck, not a lot was retrofitted. I guess there will always need to be some manual switches, but one would think that a good chuck of 'em could all be controlled by a flight computer nowadays.
