VND-M2.05 - external data storage from "NIIFI and VT". What was it and what are the consequences?

A couple of weeks ago, among the large stream of articles of our beloved site, a publication flashed about how the role of military developments, especially domestic , has recently increased, thanks to the introduction of their outstanding results in the most advanced fields of civil science and technology.
Frankly, then I expressed cautious optimism in the comments to this article ...
However, today I got the news, which radically changed my attitude on this issue.

The latest development of JSC "NIIFI and VT" surpassed all the possibilities of my imagination ...

Especially I want to note that this is not some kind of spherical horse in a vacuum - we all know that our outstanding military scientists do not always bring their breakthrough scientific ideas to a real embodiment, not so long ago they even received another scolding from the government.
No, today we are talking about a finished product, embodied in hardware, which can be purchased for a very modest amount - 4 million rubles, or more precisely 3,700,000 rubles, using the public procurement site.
I will not try the reader's patience anymore, it will be a question of the newest external hard disk weighing about 25 kilograms. With the rest of the parameters of this epochal gadget interested reader can see under the cut. Then I quite seriously propose to discuss what it means to manufacture such devices and how this might affect our defense capability.

The main characteristics of the external drive, which received the name of VND-M2.05 :

• capacity - 50 MB;
• exchange rate - 155 KB / s;
• dimensions - 50x25.4x38.0 cm;
• temperature range of work - from minus 10 to plus 50 degrees Celsius;
• weight - 25 kg;
• data interface - Manchester-2;
• the cost of 3 700 000 rubles;

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Without a doubt, any domestic geek wants to purchase such a device for personal use, but there are constraints. I propose to take part in a survey that can help our scientists to remove the main obstacles to the widespread introduction of the product into the masses. However, the release of this product can serve as a reason for discussing serious issues:

• Does it make sense today in the production of this kind of products today?
• What is more correct - to produce spare parts of a complex and responsible system to its full deterioration in its original form or to subject modifications in order to increase reliability and reduce costs?
• How to determine the line when the critical system is outdated morally and physically?
• What to do in this case - to modify or build a fundamentally new, and can build in advance?

This article should be perceived rather as an invitation to the discussion - everyone can express his point of view in the comments and argue with his opponents.

Sarcasm aside.

Back in 1989, I, as a graduate of MIET, got into military training in the Kaliningrad region. Outpost of the USSR in the west. We served for a month in the unit associated with military air defense. There, the production technology of the early sixties of the last century was on combat duty. "It was" a very good word, because not more than ten percent of the machines were intact! The officers at that time looked at this technique as rams on the new pardon the old gate. Probably only despair forced them to set up an experiment and give four students the opportunity, instead of practicing the combat step on the parade, to start repairing this technology.
We did not have a unique team and as a result, in less than a couple of weeks we brought 8 units of military equipment into working condition! I think we would have repaired everything there if one of the soldiers had not connected the battery. Because of this, such a nix was raised that we were removed from work. Just in case.
Why am I telling all this? The fact is that for all the two weeks we had to use the soldering iron only once, during the repair of the radio altimeter! The rest of the repair was to search for faulty boards and replace them with serviceable ones from among zip. The problem was not the cruel use of machines, but that the electronics were literally devoured by the tin plague.
Well, if the phenomenon of buying the hero of the article “VND-M2.05” is explained by a banal cut, a museum exhibit of 30 years old was found in the bins miraculously preserved and pushed a friend to the general. What if not? If everything is serious and it is really assembled from parts produced 40 years ago, according to the yellowed sheets of documentation, to replace the already completely falling apart predecessor?
This suggests that we are on duty in the most critical areas related to global air defense at best, and at worst in the nuclear forces, are still working here and most likely much older ones , and nobody even not going to upgrade. What will happen if someone with a red button tries to power this system? Implications may be ABSOLUTELY UNPREDICTABLE. What will fly, what does not, what will jerk right in the mines and what then where it will fall in this case is impossible to predict today.
My second survey is quite serious and is connected with the fact that it forces our developers to use such a backward element base in such products, even if they are used to upgrade / repair products 30-40 years old and elements of strategic forces. Something tells me that an SSD disk or even a FLASH memory chip (with the appropriate driver) even in a small lead container will work much more reliably, and weigh and consume much less. What is this inertness of thinking, cutting, insanity, or is there really a serious need for such decisions?



But how can we do it differently if we do not produce modern FLASH and do not give import to buy?

We make, gentlemen, we make.
There is such a Russian company Milandr, which perfectly produces both suitable memory and microcontrollers with fifth acceptance at high but quite reasonable prices. Even with redundancy and majoritarian drive on its basis will cost five times cheaper and at the same time surpass our hero in absolutely all parameters.
Here is the link

The statement “The replaced equipment is extremely difficult, the knowledge that created it was lost and could not be returned, so it is better to repeat the old one for any money.” Is this a myth or a reality?

Let's try to figure it out. Based on the knowledge of military equipment that still remains in my memory, the release of which started 30 or more years ago, these are largely ingenious devices. Whole institutions worked on them, but their whole genius lies in the fact that they solved the problem with very limited resources. As a result, very narrowly specialized devices were obtained with a well-designed, but very tough algorithm of operation.



Today, the capabilities of a very mediocre AWP are such that they make it easy to cope with all data processing in the same KBU, and the design systems are so good that it will require the work of a very small team - one programmer, a couple of designers and a couple more people for documentation. During the year of operation, the entire command and control cabin can be completely transferred to the new base, throwing out 90 percent of the iron and leaving the user interface and the logic of work in the same state. In this case, it will be enough purely Russian configuration. Even despite some questions to its reliability, well-designed devices will be much more reliable than equipment falling apart from old age.

I can cite many examples, but from civil life, where I have to count money.

I had such a proposal - to make the modern management of the old Soviet microscope - the main problem is the processing of information about the movement in three axes from the cunning optical encoders.
I suggested 120 thousand I remember for solving the problem, I recently found out that my friend from Nizhny Novgorod made it for 100. As a result, three microscopes that were available at the institute were connected to modern computers via USB. The work took a couple of months. My other acquaintances successfully engaged in projects of an upgrade of electronics and software for spectrometers based on NMR. Connecting old, still Soviet high-precision machine tools to the management of modern computers, many have turned into a well-established business.
The devil is not so terrible as he is painted, there would be a desire, a decent manager and a desire to steal funds allocated from the budget, limited by reasonable limits.

Well, the last. Even the black boxes of MIGs are made on FLASH, but they do it ineptly and on the basis of components not intended for this , not only imported, but also, at best, in industrial design. Note that no severity of military acceptance at the same time does not interfere with the installation of these crafts on airplanes involved in actual combat! Perhaps the fear of such a "modernization" is one of the decisive factors in favor of the further production of obsolete and physically obsolete products. By the way, a good link about black boxes .

VND-M2.05 - the brainchild of the State Duma?

I am afraid that the following decision may make the practice of forcing and selling such products constant, which will lead not only to huge wasted funds, but also to an accelerated lag in the field of truly modern developments.

06/10/2016 The State Duma introduces fines of up to 1 million rubles. for the failure of the supplier to contract in the framework of the defense order
The State Duma adopted in the first reading a draft law that provides for fines of up to 1 million rubles for the supplier’s refusal to enter into a binding contract for it under the state defense order (GOZ).
The Chamber amended the Code of Administrative Offenses of the Russian Federation (CAO RF).
They, in particular, impose sanctions for the refusal or evasion of a supplier of Russian weapons and military equipment that do not have domestic counterparts, as well as the sole performer or contractor defined by the legislative acts of the Russian Federation, the president and the government, from concluding a mandatory state contract for the state defense order. It is envisaged that the fine in this case will be from 30 thousand to 50 thousand rubles, for legal entities - from 300 thousand to 1 million rubles.
A similar punishment is provided for “refusal or evasion of a supplier (performer, contractor) occupying a dominant position in accordance with the legislation of the Russian Federation in the field of state defense, if the conclusion of such a contract is mandatory for the said person.”