[Beowulf] Re: blackbox on Mars?

[Joe Landman]

Robert G. Brown wrote:

> Has anyone remarked on the absurdity of sending a cluster to the surface
> of Mars under any cirmcumstances?  What in the world would it do that
> couldn't be done far cheaper back on earth, or in orbit?  There are damn

I am not sure even "in-orbit" would be needed in most cases.  The 
(economic) cost to lift stuff per kg is quite high, and clusters are not 
known to be the most efficient use of mass with lots of replicated parts 
...  A really high bandwidth link, or some really fast accelerated 
computing boards might be more appropriate, though the increased 
radiation environment might make such things harder to protect.

Of course once we learn how to control self-assembly lines, we could 
have clusters build themselves ...

-- 

Joseph Landman, Ph.D
Founder and CEO
Scalable Informatics LLC,
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