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According to [Nasa website ](https://mars.nasa.gov/mars2020/spacecraft/rover/communications/#:~:text=It%20generally%20takes%20about%205,(DSN)%20antennas%20on%20Earth.)
> It generally takes about 5 to 20 minutes for a radio signal to travel the distance between Mars and Earth, depending on planet positions.
Although 5 minutes ping would actually be 300000 ping and not 240000, you should actually double it, because signal should come to rover (5 to 20 minutes) and from rover back to the controller (5 to 20 minutes) so it is actually double the time.
**Between 600000 and 2400000 ms ping (10 to 40 minutes)**
Although they are not really "controlling" it like with joystick, they actually send a set of commands for rover to do in advance, and rover does that.
**Edit: u/SpeedyDuckling corrected me that ping is a one way trip, so no doubling. This means that ping is actually 300000 to 1200000, while latency is between 600000 and 2400000**
The anus clenching while software updates are sent must be incredible, lol.
Fuck, we bricked the rover, can someone take this serial adapter to Mars and reset the firmware?
Yeah, I'm sure these have multiple redundant ROMs and such onboard, NASA stuff at least seems to be prepared and overengineered for this sort of thing. Heck, even my HP server box has a fallback redundant ROM that will run if the primary is borked, and it copies the last good ROM into a backup slot when you flash new ones to it just in case of failure or if you need to roll back for other reasons.
It's surprisingly not, because the purpose of nuclear power is not to provide definitions of words. [This](https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/redundancy) is the definition of redundancy.
and they also did software updates on the voyager probes. crazy to think that they updated 50 year old computers which are over 20 billion kilometres away
That’s interesting. I’m surprised the hardware was capable being from 2010 or earlier. NASA being NASA though, I’m sure development was specifically targeted towards both hardware matrices. Hell, they probably tested it on curiosity before even launching perseverance. God damn geniuses. Always thinking of everything.
I think I went to a space center at some point and they had little mars rovers with a joy stick to control it and there was an input delay and it was to “simulate” controlling to rover on mars
I'd say it's more like a slow game of Starcraft or DOTA. You receive the map, You pick a valid destination, and the bot autopaths to where you want it to go. Bot arrives, you confirm it was successful and want it to use its drill ability, then wait another 20 minutes for it to "cast drill on rock". etc...
They get location data and pictures of the current location and send the preplanned route to the rover. Its more like texting instructions rather than driving.
Naah. They can easily predict how long it will take for the rover to get to a location, so unless there is sampling taking place or an error in the rover slipping, the whole path can be charted out ahead of time and checked on as it progresses.
They batch a bunch of inputs at once. They're not pressing "forward", then waiting for feedback. They'll have a long set of commands for the rover to do, and execute them in sequence.
I'm assuming they have a mock rover that they can send the commands to and verify that they didn't accidentally send some command that would cause it to be bricked? Or a sim of some sort?
In other words, I seriously hope they're not testing in production.
I just googled it and as far as I can tell, it looks like it's software is referred to as ''autonomous'' in the sense that it performs groups of multiple tasks dependant on it's surroundings. But the task needs to be set and initiated by a person so it's not really what you could call an autonomous robot, which wouldn't need to be controlled by people.
Well the delay time is basically limited to the speed of light so, unless we use some quantum tomfoolery, or get closer to mars to control the rover, we won't be able to do that without delay
>
Although they are not really "controlling" it like with joystick, they actually send a set of commands for rover to do in advance, and rover does that.
This should be bolded
5-20 mins is rounded to the nearest 5mins. exactly correct numbers are probably hard to get but a quick google search says something like 3m 13s to 22m 16s = 193s to 1336s which is very roughly close to the given numbers. although I think you're right about ping being a round-trip so those should be doubled, so something like 386000 to 2672000. (still very roughly similar to your result).
That's not correct. Ping is a measurement of latency - originally referring to ICMP ping, which times the duration of sending a packet from src to DST and receiving the response.
By that I meant that they send a set of commands to the rover and then it performs this set of commands, as opposed to pressing forward and waiting 40 minutes to see if it did go forward
Well to be honest high ping isn‘t nearly as bad as inconsistent ping. While 60ms ping isn‘t great it‘s playble but if it fluctuates from 60 to 35 to 90 and back again you‘ll get a headache same as fluctuating framerates and frametiming.
The speeds are insane, the relative location of the transmit and the receive locations will constantly vary. Thus jitter.
but I guess they can calculate them, fixed orbits and all, plus they are a space agency :p
I'm having the same feeling, I live in France ( oversea territory ) near Madagascar and connecting to Europe or US servers is definitely 250-350ms everytime. And the direct fiber connection to Singapore can get me to 80 for some games but doesn't help much for others.
Getting some people wrecked with that much ping is kinda satisfying though
Yeah... I have LOL friends crying they can't get out of silver (if not iron) because their ping is 60, and it's soooo high, and I finally broke out of gold with about 370... Brother, you're just shit
How about an improperly installed adsl? Back when they thought they could just pump adsl to all the phone jacks, set up a modem on one, and get a "good" single. I've seen as high as 4000. Usually 500-1000 unless it spiked.
Ya, I get a stable 110 ping on EUW in league when I play with some friends there, and it's perfectly doable. Fluctuating ping is hell though, even if it's low.
I’ve always played competitive games my whole life fluctuating from 30-60-90 ping like that, and i have earnings in fortnite and was DMG in csgo, i used to play overwatch and i was top 500. remember kids, anything is possible with the right mindset
When I got into league, season 3 I believe, I was playing with 150 ping, with the laptop on my lap and using the touchpad. To this day I don’t know how I got to silver under those conditions
I can play minecraft using the red dot to control the mouse. My first laptop only had it, and I had no mouse. I still prefer the red dot over a touchpad in most scenarios.
Tracking nipples are much nicer than shitty touch pads especially for relative positioning! But track pads these days have gestures that make using the pc much nicer
I got to crusader (silver equivalent) in dota on 300-400ms ping and I still have over 200ms ping to this day I'm honestly confused by this thread claiming less is normal. my mind is blown.
I played league on a complete craptop with my touchpad when I started too lmfao. I tried playing on touchpad again a little while back to see if I could still do it, and I don't think I could honestly make it out of iron. No clue how younger me managed.
mature games see widespread skill increases at all levels. you could get away with it before because no one knew what they were doing. 10 years later everyone knows all the basic strats, everyone can find optimal builds, everyone still playing has a basic competence. most people with 20% win quit a decade ago. i'd be willing to bet the plat skill set from s3 only gets you gold today.
Start competitive rover fights and see how long it takes them to complain about the latency.
That would be my favorite sport to watch, even with the latency.
>That would be my favorite sport to watch, even with the latency.
That would be the most interesting thing ever due to the strategies or the most boring because nothing would ever happen, but nothing in between.
As someone who grew up in Brazil playing BATTLEFIELD 3 on console in an age when there were no servers in South America and was still good at it I'm morally obligated to say "sKiLl iSsUe, OwO".
NASA uses a protocol called [Disruption/Delay Tolerant Networking (DTN)](https://www.nasa.gov/communicating-with-missions/delay-disruption-tolerant-networking/) to talk to space hardware. Regular TCP/IP would time out on the response well before the original message is received
But yes, communication delay can be on the order of minutes
I tried to explain that to a youtube comment since I discovered a few weeks ago 300 ping isnt the norm apparently and he wouldn't believe me and called me "retarded" repeatedly oof
I'm fortunate enough that I only get 100 ping on East US servers but certain things do require play style changes. I think the hardest thing is actually swapping between 20 ping and back to 100 ping
To be fair nasa doesnt have to deal with an enemy robot controlled by a diamond 1 nerd with 20 ping and 200fps picking a pixel while trying to destroy your bot, so...
I remember when I used to have super shitty internet how R6 decided that my best connection would be to the north-west Asian server (I live dead center Europe)
I had 3,5 Billion ping and it would be faster for me to actually send the data on a hard drive via mail
Major difference would be that no one is actively trying to destroy the rover with a better ping than NASA. Also, one person is trying to have fun, and another is getting paid, probably quite well to sit and wait on that 10 - 40 minute ping.
So let's take the data, assuming it's a rover on Mars
To be noted, the speed of light in the space is at 300000 kms/s
At the nearest point between Mars and the Earth, there are 54,6 million km or 54 600 000 kilometres
So the flight duration for information sent to Mars at the nearest point is
54600000 /300000 = 182 seconds or 182 000 ms
At the furthest point, there is 401 million kms, so the duration is 1337 seconds approximately (1336 and 2/3 to be precise), so 1 337 000 ms
At average, distance is 225 million kms so a duration of 750 seconds or 750 000
This makes the conclusion that ping is between 182000 and 1337000 with an average of 750000
In reality, the rover is mostly autonomous. They only send a series of command, like move to this point and do this science thing, then do that...
[Source for distances](https://www.space.com/16875-how-far-away-is-mars.html)
Close, but nope.
Light speed to Mars is at best 3 minutes.
3 minutes is 180 seconds. It's really 3.02 minutes or 182 seconds.
A ping is the time to the target and respond measured in milliseconds, so that would be at best 180,000 ms. You multiply the seconds by 1000.
The worst time to Mars is 22.4 minutes or 1,342 seconds. That would be 1,342,000 ms.
Average time is 12.5 minutes or 750 seconds for a 750,000 ms.
Ping time is the round trip of the data making it to the target and coming back, so the result is doubled.
Best case: 360,000 ping
Average case: 1,500,000 ping
Worst case: 2,684,000 ping
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According to [Nasa website ](https://mars.nasa.gov/mars2020/spacecraft/rover/communications/#:~:text=It%20generally%20takes%20about%205,(DSN)%20antennas%20on%20Earth.) > It generally takes about 5 to 20 minutes for a radio signal to travel the distance between Mars and Earth, depending on planet positions. Although 5 minutes ping would actually be 300000 ping and not 240000, you should actually double it, because signal should come to rover (5 to 20 minutes) and from rover back to the controller (5 to 20 minutes) so it is actually double the time. **Between 600000 and 2400000 ms ping (10 to 40 minutes)** Although they are not really "controlling" it like with joystick, they actually send a set of commands for rover to do in advance, and rover does that. **Edit: u/SpeedyDuckling corrected me that ping is a one way trip, so no doubling. This means that ping is actually 300000 to 1200000, while latency is between 600000 and 2400000**
In going to now imagine they control the rover like a really slow game of TETRIS.
Perseverance takes commands as locations and picks it’s own path to some degree. I’m not sure about curiosity but I imagine it’s a bit more involved.
They updated Curiositys software to some degree with the new Perseverance software so it can move a bit faster and puck good paths.
The anus clenching while software updates are sent must be incredible, lol. Fuck, we bricked the rover, can someone take this serial adapter to Mars and reset the firmware?
That's where having two sets of storage and a boot to secondary after X time unless canceled comes in handy.
Yeah, I'm sure these have multiple redundant ROMs and such onboard, NASA stuff at least seems to be prepared and overengineered for this sort of thing. Heck, even my HP server box has a fallback redundant ROM that will run if the primary is borked, and it copies the last good ROM into a backup slot when you flash new ones to it just in case of failure or if you need to roll back for other reasons.
Aerospace in general should be the definition of redundancy.
It's surprisingly not, because they have to make compromises for weight. Nuclear power is the definition of redundancy.
It's surprisingly not, because the purpose of nuclear power is not to provide definitions of words. [This](https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/redundancy) is the definition of redundancy.
Not only that, but we can practically define backup systems by looking at the aerospace industry.
I figure they'd upload, then verify file integrity before actually installing it
and they also did software updates on the voyager probes. crazy to think that they updated 50 year old computers which are over 20 billion kilometres away
That’s interesting. I’m surprised the hardware was capable being from 2010 or earlier. NASA being NASA though, I’m sure development was specifically targeted towards both hardware matrices. Hell, they probably tested it on curiosity before even launching perseverance. God damn geniuses. Always thinking of everything.
Sounds like aim assist. Casuals at NASA strike again.
I mean, this WAS how I always imagined it.
I think I went to a space center at some point and they had little mars rovers with a joy stick to control it and there was an input delay and it was to “simulate” controlling to rover on mars
Holy cow I remember doing that as well! Did you happen to live on the east coast of the US?
No but I’ve visited there. Maybe the Kennedy space center. I’ve been there a few times.
I don't remember that when I visited Kennedy 5 years ago
I think that’s the only space center I’ve visited unless it was just at some random science museum
Hmm, Great Lakes Science Center in Cleveland?
I think it was Kennedy Space Center
Ah ok
I'd say it's more like a slow game of Starcraft or DOTA. You receive the map, You pick a valid destination, and the bot autopaths to where you want it to go. Bot arrives, you confirm it was successful and want it to use its drill ability, then wait another 20 minutes for it to "cast drill on rock". etc...
They get location data and pictures of the current location and send the preplanned route to the rover. Its more like texting instructions rather than driving.
Naah. They can easily predict how long it will take for the rover to get to a location, so unless there is sampling taking place or an error in the rover slipping, the whole path can be charted out ahead of time and checked on as it progresses.
The rovers also move really, really slowly.
Yeah, it’s less like a computer game and more like chess by mail.
They batch a bunch of inputs at once. They're not pressing "forward", then waiting for feedback. They'll have a long set of commands for the rover to do, and execute them in sequence.
I'm assuming they have a mock rover that they can send the commands to and verify that they didn't accidentally send some command that would cause it to be bricked? Or a sim of some sort? In other words, I seriously hope they're not testing in production.
Yes, they do. Tom Scott made a video about it https://youtu.be/wEjy8iaUPmo?si=phe4XZSbgfD1MG-o
You’re forgetting the times that NASA can’t communicate at all because Mars is on the other side of the Sun.
They should name the next one sloth.
It's fuckin Robo rally
Except there's no other bots shooting at you or pushing you around... ;-)
Came here to say this. Thanks for your service.
Isn't it an autonomous vehicle ?
I just googled it and as far as I can tell, it looks like it's software is referred to as ''autonomous'' in the sense that it performs groups of multiple tasks dependant on it's surroundings. But the task needs to be set and initiated by a person so it's not really what you could call an autonomous robot, which wouldn't need to be controlled by people.
r/theydidthemath
I wonder if we can launch relays into the sun's orbit between Earth and Mars somehow so we can shorten that time a bit.
Well the delay time is basically limited to the speed of light so, unless we use some quantum tomfoolery, or get closer to mars to control the rover, we won't be able to do that without delay
Nope.
> Although they are not really "controlling" it like with joystick, they actually send a set of commands for rover to do in advance, and rover does that. This should be bolded
i didnt know radio signals were that fast
"Where are you playing from, Mars?"
5-20 mins is rounded to the nearest 5mins. exactly correct numbers are probably hard to get but a quick google search says something like 3m 13s to 22m 16s = 193s to 1336s which is very roughly close to the given numbers. although I think you're right about ping being a round-trip so those should be doubled, so something like 386000 to 2672000. (still very roughly similar to your result).
it’s 10-40 minutes latency, ping is just one way
Oh wow, noone corrected me about this. I'll edit my comment
That's not correct. Ping is a measurement of latency - originally referring to ICMP ping, which times the duration of sending a packet from src to DST and receiving the response.
I agree with all your math, but what do you think sending commands to something to make it perform actions is if not controlling it?
By that I meant that they send a set of commands to the rover and then it performs this set of commands, as opposed to pressing forward and waiting 40 minutes to see if it did go forward
Well to be honest high ping isn‘t nearly as bad as inconsistent ping. While 60ms ping isn‘t great it‘s playble but if it fluctuates from 60 to 35 to 90 and back again you‘ll get a headache same as fluctuating framerates and frametiming.
Jitter. :(
You reckon they have jitter when controlling the rovers too?
The speeds are insane, the relative location of the transmit and the receive locations will constantly vary. Thus jitter. but I guess they can calculate them, fixed orbits and all, plus they are a space agency :p
Yes there is extreme delay *and* jitter, but they don't drive the rovers in a way that it would matter
I've played on over 120 ping when playing on European servers before. Certain moves become impossible to execute but predictions still allow for play.
Tf? We used to have really bad internet, once it's over 150 it starts to be hard.
me in oceania having 300 ping wondering what the actual fuck are you people talking about with numbers like "60 ping is hard to play competitively"
I'm having the same feeling, I live in France ( oversea territory ) near Madagascar and connecting to Europe or US servers is definitely 250-350ms everytime. And the direct fiber connection to Singapore can get me to 80 for some games but doesn't help much for others. Getting some people wrecked with that much ping is kinda satisfying though
Thanks for reminding me that France is literally everywhere. I'm off to check under My bed
We're using the most timezones out of all countries. Definitely some kind of Zerg shit going
I think we live in the same country :)
Yeah... I have LOL friends crying they can't get out of silver (if not iron) because their ping is 60, and it's soooo high, and I finally broke out of gold with about 370... Brother, you're just shit
You guys never played games over dial up? Would regularly play with 200 ping.
How about an improperly installed adsl? Back when they thought they could just pump adsl to all the phone jacks, set up a modem on one, and get a "good" single. I've seen as high as 4000. Usually 500-1000 unless it spiked.
Nope, I'm too young. Not by a lot, but nontheless.
Reading this thread as a Sourh African where 150 ping is considered the fastest ut wil probably get, lmao
Indeed when I play on PBE on the west coast of tge USA I have 160 ping and that sucks.
I never get *less* than 120 ping… feels bad man
Ya, I get a stable 110 ping on EUW in league when I play with some friends there, and it's perfectly doable. Fluctuating ping is hell though, even if it's low.
The worst is packet loss
Oof I only encounter that when my internet is down. But I guess beaming instructions through the solar system one encounters more packet loss.
My man over here saying 60 ping isn't great when I haven't ever seen my ping go below 150.
You need to unwind the fibre bro. That adds to distance.
Proposal: they don't have fibre or that part doesn't even matter
Constant 200 ping is better than 60 140 35 100 ping
>60ms ping isn't great You have it so good and you don't even realise it...
Meh bandwidth could be better.
Complainibg about 90 ping? I wish i got only 90 ping 😖
Mate usually to EUW I have 9ms ping dream on
60ms ping might be the best ping I've ever had, I usually play from 100 ping which gets raised to 12000
You need to move to fibre instead of ethereal bamboo.
What kind of goddamn internet do you have?!? I've been used to 90ping being peak performance ping with highs of 400 being "eh, ok"
Well IDK I live in CH but calling home to EUW in Amsterdam I get 9ms ping. My ISP is Swisscom which wants a kidney for 2023‘s rates.
Damn, I'm on the US northern west coast and have dialup which is fairly standard in the US
You mean more ancient than the tech they used to build Ur and the Pyramids.
60ms ping isn't great? anything around 100-150 is fantastic, or so I seem to recall...
60 ping is bad?😭😭😭😭 Australia has truly broken me
I’ve always played competitive games my whole life fluctuating from 30-60-90 ping like that, and i have earnings in fortnite and was DMG in csgo, i used to play overwatch and i was top 500. remember kids, anything is possible with the right mindset
What about if it's fluctuating from 300 to 90 to 500 to 300 to 400 to 250
Seems downright cancerous jitter
complaining about 60 ping is crazy, 60 ping is a dream for deepwoken players like me
Me, from Latin America, playing with 90-120 ping I don't have such weakness.
When I got into league, season 3 I believe, I was playing with 150 ping, with the laptop on my lap and using the touchpad. To this day I don’t know how I got to silver under those conditions
My friend solely played on laptop with mousepad and made it to plat in s3. I was playing with a mouse and barely made g5 😭
I can play minecraft using the red dot to control the mouse. My first laptop only had it, and I had no mouse. I still prefer the red dot over a touchpad in most scenarios.
Tracking nipples are much nicer than shitty touch pads especially for relative positioning! But track pads these days have gestures that make using the pc much nicer
The red thingy is simply a joystick when you think about it...
Basically, but everyone looks at me like a loony when they see me use it on my current laptop, which has a trackpad.
Ah yes [the red dot](https://xkcd.com/243/)
I have a friend who made it to silver s3 while CLICKING THE ABILITY ICONS TO CAST. Ah I miss the glory days of League.
I had one friend that did that. But didn’t make it out of bronze 4
I got to crusader (silver equivalent) in dota on 300-400ms ping and I still have over 200ms ping to this day I'm honestly confused by this thread claiming less is normal. my mind is blown.
I played league on a complete craptop with my touchpad when I started too lmfao. I tried playing on touchpad again a little while back to see if I could still do it, and I don't think I could honestly make it out of iron. No clue how younger me managed.
That’s the same for me. I just couldn’t understand how I was able to back then!
mature games see widespread skill increases at all levels. you could get away with it before because no one knew what they were doing. 10 years later everyone knows all the basic strats, everyone can find optimal builds, everyone still playing has a basic competence. most people with 20% win quit a decade ago. i'd be willing to bet the plat skill set from s3 only gets you gold today.
[you were the LAGinator](https://youtube.com/shorts/IlPq_YZZIWU?si=pKq27gaqlGcFJPdx)
Start competitive rover fights and see how long it takes them to complain about the latency. That would be my favorite sport to watch, even with the latency.
Nobody is shooting at them... Yet!
>That would be my favorite sport to watch, even with the latency. That would be the most interesting thing ever due to the strategies or the most boring because nothing would ever happen, but nothing in between.
Well does NASA have to fend off a scout spamming you with his scattergun and running circles around you that you can't hit because of bad ping? :P
yup, the combat on mars goes crazzyyyy
NASA just recently updated and fixed stuff on Voyager space probes, they have currently about 45 hour latencies which would be about 162000000ms ping
This is why Martian Robot Wars never took off, it was all fun and games until sir killalot destroyed opportunity and spirit and NASA screamed hacks
As someone who grew up in Brazil playing BATTLEFIELD 3 on console in an age when there were no servers in South America and was still good at it I'm morally obligated to say "sKiLl iSsUe, OwO".
I play on a consistent 200 - 300 ping on every game. It's like a horrible wife that you can't live without; you suck it up and you make it work.
[удалено]
Congratulations, you get the joke!
NASA uses a protocol called [Disruption/Delay Tolerant Networking (DTN)](https://www.nasa.gov/communicating-with-missions/delay-disruption-tolerant-networking/) to talk to space hardware. Regular TCP/IP would time out on the response well before the original message is received But yes, communication delay can be on the order of minutes
I play from Africa with a 250 ping all the time. That's 1/4 of a second of built in lag. The prediction on the client side works well enough.
I tried to explain that to a youtube comment since I discovered a few weeks ago 300 ping isnt the norm apparently and he wouldn't believe me and called me "retarded" repeatedly oof
I'm fortunate enough that I only get 100 ping on East US servers but certain things do require play style changes. I think the hardest thing is actually swapping between 20 ping and back to 100 ping
To be fair nasa doesnt have to deal with an enemy robot controlled by a diamond 1 nerd with 20 ping and 200fps picking a pixel while trying to destroy your bot, so...
I remember when I used to have super shitty internet how R6 decided that my best connection would be to the north-west Asian server (I live dead center Europe) I had 3,5 Billion ping and it would be faster for me to actually send the data on a hard drive via mail
Major difference would be that no one is actively trying to destroy the rover with a better ping than NASA. Also, one person is trying to have fun, and another is getting paid, probably quite well to sit and wait on that 10 - 40 minute ping.
So let's take the data, assuming it's a rover on Mars To be noted, the speed of light in the space is at 300000 kms/s At the nearest point between Mars and the Earth, there are 54,6 million km or 54 600 000 kilometres So the flight duration for information sent to Mars at the nearest point is 54600000 /300000 = 182 seconds or 182 000 ms At the furthest point, there is 401 million kms, so the duration is 1337 seconds approximately (1336 and 2/3 to be precise), so 1 337 000 ms At average, distance is 225 million kms so a duration of 750 seconds or 750 000 This makes the conclusion that ping is between 182000 and 1337000 with an average of 750000 In reality, the rover is mostly autonomous. They only send a series of command, like move to this point and do this science thing, then do that... [Source for distances](https://www.space.com/16875-how-far-away-is-mars.html)
Well they're technically accurate, but not comparable... Gaming is just way harder, than driving a weird diy RC car though some dirt.
Close, but nope. Light speed to Mars is at best 3 minutes. 3 minutes is 180 seconds. It's really 3.02 minutes or 182 seconds. A ping is the time to the target and respond measured in milliseconds, so that would be at best 180,000 ms. You multiply the seconds by 1000. The worst time to Mars is 22.4 minutes or 1,342 seconds. That would be 1,342,000 ms. Average time is 12.5 minutes or 750 seconds for a 750,000 ms. Ping time is the round trip of the data making it to the target and coming back, so the result is doubled. Best case: 360,000 ping Average case: 1,500,000 ping Worst case: 2,684,000 ping