I am about to purchase an ASP and explore, BUT

Beatz0121 · Apr 18, 2015

what are your recommendations on the start zone?

Obviously I am not going to start anywhere near SOL or I Bootis, ETC. everything has probably been explored a thousand times over. I am after Unexplored systems.

I was thinking shooting South through the Solar System instead of left to right. I am sure most people naturally go left or right forward backward

Is starting 1000LY away from SOL a good starting point? or should I start even further?

any advice is appreciated.

PS. I am also going to stay away from the rim. I am assuming that has been all cleared out.

But what do I know? I cant count to 10 let alone 400 billion!

Bladesteel · Apr 18, 2015

I'm now about 2.5k out. And for a while now it's been mosly systems where noone has been (or noy sold data yet)
Mind you, I'm not taking the direct approach to my target nebula. And I expect to see more scanned systems when i reach it.

Shanaeri · Apr 18, 2015

Just head towards where you find interesting. Most explorers use the max jump range route, rather than economical so there are lots of gaps in which to make your mark. At last count we've found less than 0.0001% of the 400 billion systems there are. Lots left for everyone

dognosh · Apr 18, 2015

nothing has been cleared out.
We have 400 billion systems, I doubt even 100 million have been discovered.

CMDR NightsLong · Apr 18, 2015

I simply pick a direction and go. plot a 1000 LY course and once around 500 LY from starting pos start to examine every system to see if it's worthy of scanning planets. Of course if plants are really near the star then you may as well scan them. Once you have reached the end of the course plot another 1000LY and so on. this is roughly what I do, but i tend to stay out for ages and go around 20-40k LY.

Skuli · Apr 18, 2015

I found a completely unexplored system less than 200ly from inhabited space yesterday.

There's plenty of locations to put your mark on.

Midian Cabal · Apr 18, 2015

Any way is good.

Try visiting some touristic places like nebulas or just shoot any way you like if you want your name on some uncharted territory.

pippo · Apr 18, 2015

Beatz0121 said:
PS. I am also going to stay away from the rim. I am assuming that has been all cleared out.

If you were going to stay away from the core, I would understand… but the rim man, it's huge and I'm sure there's a lot to plant your flag there.
Actually any direction… like someone said earlier, less than 1% has been covered so far.

Jackie Silver · Apr 18, 2015

I recommend that you head east-south-east, roughly 200 ly above or below the plane; last time I was out that way I was hitting unexplored systems including catalogue stars well inside 1000ly. (Although there was a major expedition towards the Regor blocked sector recently, so "east of Sol" may have seen more traffic than before.)

Beatz0121 · Apr 18, 2015

Thanks for all the info guys!

Just curious, How much do you get for an unexplored system roughly?

Also does the Advanced Discovery Scanner scan all the planets within the system in one thump, or do you still have to do them individually?

Bladesteel · Apr 18, 2015

Beatz0121 said:
Thanks for all the info guys!

Just curious, How much do you get for an unexplored system roughly?

Also does the Advanced Discovery Scanner scan all the planets within the system in one thump, or do you still have to do them individually?

It will find them so theyvshow up as unexplored. But if you want your name on it you'll have to get close.

pippo · Apr 18, 2015

Beatz0121 said:
How much do you get for an unexplored system roughly?

It depends on what you find in that system.
I know this picture has been posted a million times but I'm sure you will find it interesting…

EDIT: plus a little bonus if you make first discovery.

Jackie Silver · Apr 18, 2015

Bladesteel said:
It will find them so theyvshow up as unexplored. But if you want your name on it you'll have to get close.

This - and you only get 1/6th of the value for an unexplored planet as you do for one that you scan properly (and with a Detailed Surface Scanner fitted, you definitely need one of those alongside the ADS.)

Depending on your personal preference you may want to skip scanning all the iceballs and rocky iceballs out there, and you'll find more worthwhile planets if you set your star map filter to show KGFA(BO) stars only. Take my Hab zone calculator along, link in sig.

/shameless plug

Zenith · Apr 18, 2015

Beatz0121 said:
Thanks for all the info guys!

Just curious, How much do you get for an unexplored system roughly?

Also does the Advanced Discovery Scanner scan all the planets within the system in one thump, or do you still have to do them individually?

The ADS is also known as "The Spacehorn", and you only need to set it off once on entering a system. It will locate every object so you can see it on system map.
You still need to go up to the objects and scan them with your Detailed Surface Scanner (DSS) to get the full data. If you're the first person to scan that object in person, you will get your name attached to it as first discoverer when you sell your scan data back home. That also attracts a 50% bonus on the usual discovery payout.

I always scan the central star on entry to a system while charging the ADS. That lets me check the system map while the scan completes.
As a general rule of thumb, if a world looks like it's got blue water, go scan it. If it looks interesting in some way, go scan it. If you have a thing for gas giants, go scan them. There is no "right" or "wrong" way to decide what you want to scan.
However don't bother scanning asteroid belts, they are literally worthless.

DrakeAurum · Apr 19, 2015

Also note that larger objects can be scanned from further away - gas giants typically from hundreds of LS away, stars from thousands - so these bodies can be picked up relatively 'cheaply' if you don't want to fly around the whole system.

Beatz0121 · Apr 19, 2015

Thanks guys. very helpful.

I do have one more question though.

do i have a limit of how much data I can store?

could I explore 100 systems without having to sell the data or is there a limit?

DrakeAurum · Apr 19, 2015

Beatz0121 said:
Thanks guys. very helpful.

I do have one more question though.

do i have a limit of how much data I can store?

could I explore 100 systems without having to sell the data or is there a limit?

People have come back from literally months of exploration and still sold all their data.

The one thing to bear in mind is that the actual selling interface is extremely clunky for high volumes, and if you come back with hundreds or thousands of systems' worth of data, it can take a long time to sell it all.

insanephoton · Apr 19, 2015

As far as I know there isn't a limit, the main downside with surveying lots of systems is the time it takes to sell them all.

Thalkran · Apr 19, 2015

Yeah I came back from a 2 month trip a while back. That data took a while to sell even by the page.

Morlock5K · Apr 19, 2015

No limit what so ever. You can have 100,000,000 systems or just 1, makes no difference. The more you have though, the more you loose if you get blown up prior to selling and also it takes a long time to sell the data if you have several pages to sell!