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Your handheld cell phone today has more computing power than the computers on board the Apollo spacecraft did.
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Beyond that, the operating system used in those early models is no longer used.
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The hardware they had is retained in space museums but computer engineers today can't make it work because the software was not written down and no one remembers how it was structured, the computer language is obsolete and would have to be set up again from scratch, but who knows if what we would re-compose today was the same as what they had composed back in the 1960's?
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Whatever they would have had back then, it would have been able to compute the rocket direction and magnitude bursts that they used to keep the landing module properly oriented as it approached the moon's surface in order to make a safe landing. The earth was too far away to be of any use in making such calculations, as it took 2-1/2 seconds for a radio signal from the moon to reach earth and another 2-1/2 seconds for the earth's signal to reach the moon, consequently any computation even if made instantly on earth would be delayed by 5 seconds when received at the moon. The lander would have been hopelessly uncontrollable with those conditions.
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One question I have is that by looking at the hardware, we ought to be able to tell today how much wattage it required and from there we could determine what kind of battery power would have been needed to operate it. I don't recall ever seeing solar panels with photovoltaic cells on the Apollo craft, and so, whatever Galvanic cell battery power was used must have been able to keep putting out power for the duration since no way to recharge the batteries was ever disclosed. Did they use rocket-powered generators? They never said they did. The Apollo craft did not have use of nuclear energy since that was not developed yet for small packages like the Apollo craft. To top it off, they say the lunar module's batteries are what powered the so-called air conditioners that kept the astronauts cool in lunar temperatures of over 200 deg. F.
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It's hard to understand why no one would have bothered to make a copy of the Apollo mission's software, for future reference.
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I read recently about the original screenplays for Rod Serling's The Twilight Zone, how he did not write them down but that he would float in his swimming pool on an inflatable lounge, and while looking up into the evening sky, he would record his thoughts using some kind of electronic recording device. Then that was played back for the show's script, and Mr. Serling then took his recorder back to his swimming pool and spoke into it the material for the next episode in the process recording over the earlier episode's material, consequently no one has a sound recording of Rod Serling's voice dictating the screenplay for any of the Twilight Zone episodes.
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Ironically, what we are expected to believe about the Apollo missions is all too reminiscent of a Twilight Zone theme.
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