NASA continues to diagnose an error on the Hubble Space Telescope's computer system. Engineers are now preparing to switch on some of the backup hardware.The telescope's main computer went down unexpectedly on June 13. Since then, operations teams have been trying to find the cause of the problem. It is becoming increasingly difficult. NASA has released a statement on Wednesday (30 June) that stated that they are now planning to move the telescope to backup hardware after more than two weeks of work.Officials from NASA wrote that NASA was preparing and testing procedures for turning on backup hardware aboard the spacecraft in parallel to the investigation. "The telescope and the science instruments are safe and sound."Related: Here are the best Hubble Space Telescope photos of all timeNASA personnel continue to be cautious in approaching the situation. The agency estimates that they will spend approximately a week reviewing the procedures and updating them to switch Hubble back to its backup hardware. According to the statement, the team will also test their plan on a high quality simulator.The telescope's initial failure was caused by a malfunctioning memory module within the payload computer. Mission personnel believed that this defect could have been caused by an aging memory module. NASA continues to investigate the problem but the cause remains elusive.The problem may lie in a few units of the telescope's Science instrument Command and Data Handling unit (SI C&DH), which also includes the payload computing device. Technicians are still investigating the issue. NASA is focusing on the Command Unit/Science Data Formatter, which processes data, and the Power Control Unit’s power regulator, which controls how much voltage reaches payload computers.According to NASA, it would be more difficult to implement a workaround for one or both of these parts of the system than the measures NASA has evaluated over the past week.NASA personnel stated in the statement that if one of these systems is found to be the probable cause, the team will need to complete a more complex operation procedure to switch to backup units. This procedure is more complicated and more risky than the ones the team performed last week which involved switching to backup payload memory modules and hardware. Due to their connection to the SI C&DH unit, many other hardware boxes must be switched in order to switch to the backup power regulator or CU/SDF.The Hubble computer systems date back to the 1980s. They were installed by astronauts during the final servicing mission to repair the orbiting telescope in 2009. The backup computer had not been used since its departure from Earth. Engineers turned it on in tests about a week ago to see if it was experiencing the same problems as the primary computer.In 1990, astronauts launched the Hubble Space Telescope (HST) from the spacecraft Discover. The telescope has made more than 1.5 million observations over the past 31 years.Send Meghan Bartels an email at mbartels@space.com, or follow her Twitter @meghanbartels. Follow us on Facebook and Twitter @Spacedotcom
