NVM, it's the same as the aulin station. The guy earlier is right. The front ring only has two bars.
MrMarkus, that is certainly helpful! I did some further research too, it supports this - but there are some wrinkles.
Firstly, in my research I found an M type star with a surface temperature of about 2000K seems to match the screenshot. They don't go much lower. Other star types at lower temperatures than this tend to look like brown dwarf types with a dull surface, and don't match the screenshot. Though to be honest I'm not too clear on how temperature, luminosity and type affect the look of the star.
As we've noted, a star of the size in the shot must be either a giant or extremely close. I started by restricting the search to red type "big stars" with a stellar radius of over 1 sol, with an eighth moon in the same system. There are only 17 of these within 1000ly of Sol! However, none of them have low temperatures and most have otherwise unsuitable system configurations. There are 48 within 5000ly of Sol, although again hardly any have suitable configurations or temperatures.
There is nothing to stop us expanding the "big star" search outwards, but I have trouble with the idea of a clandestine organisation with ties through human space having a centuries old HQ in a random system in the middle of nowhere, both from a lore perspective and a Frontier design perspective (how would anyone ever be expected to find this?).
On the other hand, there are the "close star" candidates. There are 1000+ low temperature (1500-2250K) red stars in systems with eight moons within 1000ly of Sol. I sorted by distance to arrival and visited the very closest - Swoilz PK-Z b6-8, with a moon 260ls from the star - and checked from the moon. The star was a tiny ball in the distance, so no luck. It basically confirms that gas giants with this many moons cannot form that close to the star, and that at these distances the primary star will not match the screenshot unless it is a giant.
So, if we continue with the "close star" search - the only search which can yield a Dark Wheel anywhere near the space inhabited at game launch it seems - the star most likely cannot be a primary and must be in some kind of unusual system configuration where it gets close to the moon some other way. Possibly a red dwarf orbiting a larger star along with a gas giant, something along these lines.
There is one other possibility. It's not around a gas giant at the 8th moon. TDW is on the 8th moon. Maybe that refers the TDW and the rest refers to a different station. Also Did the TDW exist in SD on an orbit before Beyond was implemented? It is now on a surface installation which couldn't have been there before the surface expansions were added. Is this a picture of SD before beyond was added? Did they change the station type? Does anyone know if this changed at any point?
It could be possible it's like in unusual 2mass systems wehre a long string of suns exists and it could be the 8th. Those could have a gas giant that is the 8th body or an 8th sun and the gas giant is the moon itself or something unusual.
Pre beyond these were distinctly located in a system without a final number in the name. They were high value sequences with odd system or large amounts of high metal or metal rich bodies and each sector name has 1 or more of them. So, they are very searchable, but much more random.
Basic system name: "Sector XX-X X#-#"
Special sequence system name: "Sector XX-X X#"*
*First number in a sequence can be 0. (Zero)
There will usually be a large string of them per sector, but not all numbers are represented. Though most of them will be. There can be anywhere from a handfull to several hundred of them per sector. They always have weird system constructs(one type is a single star and a gas giant or single weird planet. Most are large numbers of stars or gas giants and other rarer bodies.). And they are the oldest game model for explorers to find as far as I know. They are the primary target if this is around an unusual system. Even if the system once had one of these names and has since been given a system name, you could use the search function fo find it by it's old name potentially. Just add the last number one by one to find it. And the bubble is made up of a few sectors that would have at least one of these star sequences each.
It is highly likely it is one of these system. These systems are literally to pre beyond what a super system with 10 ELW's is to current exploration. It's Exploration 101. They are/were the hottest thing to look for for anyone who knows they exist. Especially since the are so easy to find with the system name search function. And since there is literally a guarantee to be at least one sequence per sector.
I'm not sure how many of them there are compared to other system types though given the current search parameters. But if you could search their internals it may help. They have probably all been gone over, but if it's not as simple you could find the potential system at least. Maybe someone missed it with the old mechanics and never scanned it up close. Or there is a mechanic needed to get the station to appear. Or nobody notices it or something odd. It is a station, so they may just blow it off and think it's a normal station.
BTW, this would makes sense if DW was related to exploration. This is where explorers should go from a game mechanics standpoint since the dawn of the game. Potentially more important than from a lore perspective.
Also, big sectors can have multiples of these sequences and can range into hundreds of systems per sequence. Smaller sectors, like those in the bubble, have smaller sequences of them and generally one sequence per sector. Assume named systems are covering up a potential sequence at all times. The name could have been added or it could have a sub name that is part of a sequence.
This all leads me to believe this was meant to be easily findable and a fun little exploration find for dedicated explorers before heading out into larger things outside the bubble.
The other possibility, again, is that the codex is an outsiders view or similar of SD like half the info is including the SD tourist beacons and other codex information. So, did the TDW used to have a non working station around it's current location? It's an 8th moon around a gas giant. It was obviously not on a surface installation before beyond was introduced. NVM, it's on a 10th planet with a ring... Did anyone check all the H moons in SD?
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