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Friday, February 26, 2010

Project Update

Well, the Canon A470 and 200 gram weather balloons have come in. I had a Canon A480 thinking it could use CHDK but apparently it was too new. So, I purchased a used Canon A470 because it definitely can use CHDK and was $49 on EBay. I'd rather use a used, cheaper camera anyway...so long as it can take quality pictures. Point is, I don't want the darn thing falling out of the sky at 600+ miles per hour and if it breaks my family doesn't have a camera anymore....:-) So, the cheap one that can be hacked and has 7.1 megapixels will be used.

A potential issue has cropped up with my gps boostmobile phone. I noticed that the coverage range is only 20-25 miles east and west of Interstate 30, and then there is NOTHING. ZILCH. NADA. ZERO coverage. This is an obvious liability, because if the balloon travels very far out of range I'll lose it. So what to do? Well, I can try one of those balloon tracking website but so far they haven't been usable to me. I've entered in latitude, longitude, ect., but apparently the programs are very specific about what data they'll accept and it doesn't come with instructions. I'll keep trying.

My plan is to add another antenna so the signal will travel further. That is all I can do with the present phone.

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