International Space Station gets 'Man Cave,' Robonaut 2

In the narrow confines of the International Space Station, every cubic inch counts, but that won't necessarily keep NASA from building a rec room. When the Leonardo Pressurized Multipurpose Module (PMM) launches in September 2010, NASA is considering turning it into a internet-connected "man cave" isolated and quiet enough for astronauts to tweet in privacy. The connection's nothing special -- science officer T.J. Creamer compared it to that of a 14.4K modem capable of only tweets, text articles and basic browsing -- but Universe Today reports that they will also have a robotic servant, the Robonaut 2, to play with. Imagine a cramped world without fresh water or YouTube, but where you can program a state-of-the-art robot to perform monotonous tasks... We think that's a fair tradeoff, don't you?

[Thanks, Robert P.]

[Atkins Posted Mar 28th 2010 9:53AM]

Just bring an iPad.

[Atkins Posted Mar 28th 2010 9:54AM]

@Atkins Up to 64GB of porn for the 'man cave'

[gax907 Posted Mar 28th 2010 9:59AM]

@Atkins
lol imagine them docking to ISS then suddenly he announces to everyone that he forgot his ipad.

[gargle Posted Mar 28th 2010 10:00AM]

14.4k modem.. reminds me of http://xkcd.com/713/

"Meet local girls in low earth orbit tonight!!" :D

[rederikus Posted Mar 28th 2010 10:40AM]

@gargle
www.russianbrides.ru - in space.

[WeirdHero Posted Mar 28th 2010 10:00AM]

Bored astronauts alone with an advanced programmable robot.
This can end in so many bad ways.

[tompccs Posted Mar 28th 2010 10:08AM]

*Ahem* What monotonous task?

[Tyr1 Posted Mar 28th 2010 11:05AM]

@tompccs It must mean either automated monkey-spanking on demand or automated 'becoming self aware and terminating the whole crew'

[av8or Posted Mar 28th 2010 2:07PM]

@Atkins

would you want to become selfaware after being a robostroker?

[MoonWalkerCTE Posted Mar 28th 2010 10:08AM]

How do these astronauts live without sexy pronz

[Sad Sack Posted Mar 28th 2010 10:11AM]

Why can't they get satellite-based broadband say, through DirecWay or HughesNet? They're right up there with the satellites...

[Black Posted Mar 28th 2010 10:44AM]

@Sad Sack
Correct me if I am wrong, but:
I think most internet and communication satellites are geo-stationary, while the ISS is in low Earth orbit and spinning around very very fast. In consequence, it is difficult to maintain a strong permanent communication with a single point on Earth and most ISS-Earth communication has to be rerouted through other satellites on orbit ... which is alright if you want to do voice to voice communication, but not alright if you want to browse for pr0n, because rerouteing leads to high pings and small bandwidth. Right?

[CJ Posted Mar 28th 2010 5:01PM]

@Sad Sack They use S-band radio that they link with ground stations across the equator around the world. It's the most stable link you can come up with. Trying to route through satellites would be a big challenge.

[Sad Sack Posted Mar 29th 2010 2:52AM]

@CJ What you and Black posted makes sense... I don't approve of looking at porn, but you can imagine the difficulty of even viewing this site at 14.4K

[Atkins Posted Mar 28th 2010 10:12AM]

@gax907 lol, they will change it to 'rainbow cave' then

[Atkins Posted Mar 28th 2010 10:15AM]

@WeirdHero OMG! Terminator, Judgment day, 2012... it all makes sense now!

[inertone Posted Mar 28th 2010 10:16AM]

100 billion dollar+ project
a robotic servant
and all they get is "basic browsing"?
poor bastards

[Nitesh Posted Mar 28th 2010 10:19AM]

In before women crying sexism.


Wait, no, forgot this was Engadget for a second.

[Bort Simpson Posted Mar 28th 2010 10:53AM]

@Nitesh
Well the name of the science officer is TJ Creamer. CREAMER for god's sake.

A name only a mancave can love.

[av8or Posted Mar 28th 2010 2:09PM]

@Nitesh

you forget about Rule: 30

[steve19137 Posted Mar 28th 2010 10:33AM]

this could be fun... maybe... i would need at least access to flash games.

[MrHumpty Posted Mar 28th 2010 10:50AM]

@steve19137 Do we really want to subject their systems to flash bugs?

[Atkins Posted Mar 28th 2010 10:47AM]

@Black So close, yet so far...

[maattp Posted Mar 28th 2010 10:54AM]

Jesus Christ. Billions of dollars of funding and all they can get is a 14k modem.

[CJ Posted Mar 28th 2010 4:55PM]

@maattp they've been having a tough time reworking the laws of physics. They just are having a rough time improving the latency over a 385-mile radio link through the entire thickness of the atmosphere.

[maattp Posted Mar 28th 2010 6:26PM]

@CJ Ya I'm just joking around.

[Bort Simpson Posted Mar 28th 2010 10:56AM]

I suggest that the robots name be Bishop and that he be programmed to fly the ship just in case something happens... like a Queen Alien breeding in the Man Cave.

[Cy Starkman Posted Mar 28th 2010 10:57AM]

@Atkins

And the robonaut will become a unicorn.

Let's hope it doesn't shed tears though or else all hell will break loose.

[Cy Starkman Posted Mar 28th 2010 10:59AM]

14.4 seems a bit pathetic, why aren't they bouncing of a sat or something. People get broadband over them.

[CJ Posted Mar 28th 2010 4:50PM]

@Cy Starkman Satellites are geostationary while the shuttle is in LEO. They could hit a satellite for maybe 20 minutes or so and then they'd be offline again.

Their most stable link is the S-band radio link through multiple receiving stations strategically positioned around the world.

It's not the link speed, it's the latency that gets you. So it comes out to the equivalent of a 14.4 modem.

[CJ Posted Mar 28th 2010 4:58PM]

@CJ eh, fail'd my own comment. I meant the dang ISS, but it's in LEO too.

[Cy Starkman Posted Mar 28th 2010 7:36PM]

@CJ

Thanks for the detail. Fair enough

[Atkins Posted Mar 28th 2010 11:10AM]

@Tyr1 Probably both, one after the other.

[Atkins Posted Mar 28th 2010 11:13AM]

@Cy Starkman Probably because it's just an undercover psychological experiment.

[Pingles Posted Mar 28th 2010 11:26AM]

Taking estimates on how long until a stray pulse of gamma radiation turns the game robot into a killing machine.

[Ignition1 Posted Mar 28th 2010 12:14PM]

Grab the robot and prepare for some zero-G football.

[Marodir Posted Mar 28th 2010 2:51PM]

@Ignition1

Do you REALLY want to piss a robot off while in orbit with nowhere to run...?

[palindrome Posted Mar 28th 2010 3:05PM]

14.4k modem... downloading porn ... one line at a time.... yeahhhhh!!!!

[Mentat Posted Mar 28th 2010 3:59PM]

@Atkins
lol to bad they can't video conference on the iPhone.

There is no way they are only getting 14.4kbps- they stream 1080p video broadcasts down to earth all the time! My brother in laws high school did a live video conference a few months ago with 1 of the russians on board. This is either a test to see how bad they miss porn or another way to torture them since they can't shower.

[cloud858rk Posted Mar 28th 2010 4:13PM]

Google Fiber for the ISS!

[zoomzoom Posted Mar 28th 2010 6:18PM]

robonaut: "i can't let you do that Dave"

[ArfGraf Posted Mar 28th 2010 10:32PM]

Seems like they never mention battery life with these things, who wants robot snake that peters out after an hour an half into the surveillance or targeting mission, even if it is just a one use device.