A Sensors Versus (ST, SW & SG)

l33telboi · Post by **l33telboi** » Mon Apr 16, 2007 3:28 pm

In a nutshell - what Iâ€™m wondering is who has the better sensors. Ship-mounted sensors, hand-held scanning devices as well as larger installations and what they are capable of is all admissible and open for comparison in this thread.

The participants in this debate are the Empire and the Old Republic from Star Wars, the UFP from Star Trek and the Tau'ri from Stargate. I chose these because they are basically the centre-point of their own franchises.

And what I mean by 'better' is basically a collection of different things sensors are supposed to, or is able to, actually do. I'll list a few things here, but Iâ€™m sure people can figure out other stuff that's important as well:

1. Range. How far can the sensors effectively scan and perform their work? What detail do the sensors have at what range etc?

2. Abilities. What can the sensors detect, Power-sources, life-signs, hull-compositions etc? Whatever things you can recall the sensors ever being able to do and measure/identify.

3. Reliability. What has been seen interfering with the sensors and their work etc.

Praeothmin · Post by **Praeothmin** » Mon Apr 16, 2007 4:52 pm

Ok, I'll start with a few ST things, because this is the franchise I know best:
Starship sensors can detect:
-the type and number of lifeforms on the surface of a planet from orbit (ST:Gen, ST:FC, and many episodes in any series).
-Gravitation
-many different types of energy.
-their range is measured in Light-years for most sensors.

-Handheld devices can scan at distances of up to 100 meters or so, and can detect just about everything, if you know how to calibrate it.

They can be blocked by:
-Some forms of radiation, ususally being able to compensate for it, but on few occasions, they cannot compensate.

Post by **Jedi Master Spock** » Mon Apr 16, 2007 9:47 pm

SW ship grade sensors can do a good job of picking up lifesigns (or lack thereof) in an escape pod flying away from them.

2046 · Post by **2046** » Tue Apr 17, 2007 12:22 am

Star Trek lifesigns detection seems to be electrical in nature, given that Roga Danar, explicitly modified to shield his body's electrical impulses. The sensors (external and internal) were thus unable to detect him.

That said, they were later able to transport him aboard simply by scanning for any object large enough to be a humanoid male.

It ought to have been a simple thing when Danar was running amok to have the computer scan for any large mobile objects not registering as ilfeforms, but apparently that didn't occur to anyone.

That makes little sense, really, since even a tricorder can scan for residual traces of air displacement indicative of someone having walked through a cavern in Voyager. And it wasn't until Voyager that alternate methods of acquiring a target in the above-hypothesized way appeared, when in a dazzling display of technobabble Torres scanned for skeletal minerals in order to obtain a transporter lock.

("You can hide your biosigns but not your calcium, beee-otch!")

watchdog · Post by **watchdog** » Tue Apr 17, 2007 1:00 am

I dont know if you want EU material but, the sensors of an ISD has a mid-range scan radius of ten million km acording to an incident in the second Grand Admiral Thrawn book. And in another part of that trilogy it is infered that the scanners cant reach beyond a half a light year.

Post by **Mike DiCenso** » Wed Apr 18, 2007 10:38 pm

The EU, like with everything else, is very inconsistant with the sensor ranges. A little less than 3 light years seems to be the upper limit on sensor range, while in other instances, we get gems like this one from "The Bacta War" :

0 "Yag'Dhul and its moons appeared as colorful spheres hanging in space. Silhouetted against Yag'Dhul's gray face, the space station appeared to be little more than a cross - insignificant and defenseless." [ "X-Wing: The Bacta War", p. 287 ]

" 'Have you spotted the Alderaanian War Cruiser yet?'
'Negative,' reported Drysso's aide. We are clear for a hundred kilometers around us, and Virulence is reporting similar clearance.'
'Push the sensor sphere out to wo hundred kilometers, Lieutenant Waroen, and keep scanning the fringes of the system for that War cruiser. Time to engagement?'
'Ten minutes to range.'
'Bring our shields up to full.'
'As ordered, sir.'
Drysso stroked his goatee as he watched the station grow larger." [ "X-Wing: The Bacta War", p. 287 ]

The SSD was out of range, despite the fact that the ship's captain could see the station with his own eyes. Even if someone tries to argue that he saw it on a monitor, the SSD was still no more than 100 km away from the station - since that was the original sensor sphere.

Special thanks once again to the Obsidian Order archives for this.
-Mike

watchdog · Post by **watchdog** » Thu Apr 19, 2007 4:25 am

Long ago someone at SB.com claimed that they had sensors capable of detecting out to 100 ly, any idea where this supposedly came from?

Sunburst · Post by **Sunburst** » Thu Apr 19, 2007 5:54 am

Star Wars:

Can
-Detect energy/particle shields
-Jam sensors from detecting energy/particle shields
-Detect magnetic fields
-Detect close proximity
-Detect Jedi (from EU)
-Droids

Praeothmin · Post by **Praeothmin** » Thu Apr 19, 2007 12:00 pm

Sunburst wrote

Star Wars:

Can
-Detect energy/particle shields
-Jam sensors from detecting energy/particle shields
-Detect magnetic fields
-Detect close proximity
-Detect Jedi (from EU)
-Droids

So can ST (although we see jamming only mentioned infrequently... come to think of it, just as in SW).
And I'm not too sure about the droids.
Remember ANH, where the Imperial soldier didn't seem to know there were droids aboard the space capsule?
The Stormtroopers even needed to find metallic parts of R2-D2 to know that the capsule was containing droids.

Mr. Oragahn · Post by **Mr. Oragahn** » Thu Apr 19, 2007 12:27 pm

Starate is a bit tricky.

The Tau'ri has asgard sensors on their ships.

That means pretty much all Trek has been doing, maybe minus the range.
They detect all sorts of energy fluctuations, magnetic fields.

However, A 304's ones are still heavily disturbed when the ship's close to the activity of a black hole, though high level asgard sensors don't seem to be, considering asgard ships could monitor the replicators located extremely close to the black hole without much problem, that sitting at a fair distance away.

Ah, of course, are we talking about the level of tech after Unending?

That said, in general, sensors are easily able to pick up ships in hyperspace many seconds before they penetrate a stellar system.
The reverse could even be possible, but it's left open to debate. The only occasion I can think of is when Teal'c spotted Anubis' fleet in orbit of Earth in Lost City Part II, with the tel'tak's sensors, while still being in boosted hyperspace and several seconds away from exit point.
So, we don't know if ancienty O'Neill also upgraded those, or if it's a normal function.

The sensors are FTL, but I'm not sure about their range. However, since they were asgard in nature, and thus likely superior to the Goa'uld, they're at least able to go beyond any of the borders or our solar system, for any ship located on Earth.

The Tau'ri subspace comms are particularily good. Maybe the sensors have something to do with that.

On the ground, the Tau'ri has no real life sign detector. In Atlantis, they use the lantian ones, which are not particularily well detailed. The portable ones couldn't differentiate a wraith from a human, but there's the problem that McKay and co may simply not know how to use them at best.
I mean, for nearly three seasons, we were to believe that the schematics were always in 2D, and it's only recently that we saw, in Vengeance, I think, that the scanners' camera could rotate and show that the display could be rendered in 3D. Plus I think that in this episode, the detectors could actually spot the difference between a human and Michael's bugs.

Otherwise, the scanners can detect multiple energy signatures over kilometers.
I assume there's more than meet the eye. We're talking about a lantian device that is as thick as a first gen gameboy for krissake! :)

SG-1, on the other hand, don't seem to have anything that good. In the film, they have sort of close range analyzers, but nothing else permeated that much.
Now, I don't know what those PSPs' are capable of. They seem to pack a large load of functions.

l33telboi · Post by **l33telboi** » Thu Apr 19, 2007 1:28 pm

Mr. Oragahn wrote:Ah, of course, are we talking about the level of tech after Unending?

Sure, why not, it's the latest developement in the Tau'ri tech department anyway.

Now, I don't know what those PSPs' are capable of. They seem to pack a large load of functions.

Didn't they detect temporal anomalies in The Quest part 1?

Sunburst · Post by **Sunburst** » Thu Apr 19, 2007 1:35 pm

Praeothmin wrote: And I'm not too sure about the droids.
Remember ANH, where the Imperial soldier didn't seem to know there were droids aboard the space capsule?
The Stormtroopers even needed to find metallic parts of R2-D2 to know that the capsule was containing droids.

There was a droid scanner in the civilian bar at the Mos Eisley cantina.

http://nl.starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Afbee ... PT-212.jpg

Anyway, to add to the list:

Star Wars:

Can
-Detect starships in enough detail to define the class
-Jam sensors from detecting a ship
-Be obscured by asteroids
-Be obscured by rock formations on a planet (EU)
-Be obscured by special types of foliage (EU)
-Detect Gravity (EU)
-Use long range droid probes for detailed video scanning
-Detect ships less than a light year away (EU)

(BTW: I mainly use the trilogy for reference, and the EU stuff is from Zahn and Stackpole)

Mr. Oragahn · Post by **Mr. Oragahn** » Thu Apr 19, 2007 3:53 pm

l33telboi wrote:Sure, why not, it's the latest developement in the Tau'ri tech department anyway.

Much a cheat code than anything else. It's literally all the asgard tech and knowledge that's been absorbed by the Tau'ri.

Didn't they detect temporal anomalies in The Quest part 1?

I don't think so. They saw people frozen in place, and I think Carter speculated that it was a time dilation effect, so they started throwing stones to see where they had to go.

Sunburst · Post by **Sunburst** » Fri Apr 20, 2007 1:31 pm

Hey, all

More Star Wars...just because...

Star Wars

Can:
-Be blocked by some combination of Dagobahâ€™s atmosphere and Yoda
-Detect midi-chlorians....I'm sorry
-Detect the internal holds of other ships
-Can be blocked by "smuggling compartments" and other such physical shielding
-Detect weapon locks
-Detect a 2 meter target
-Detect a 6 ship fleet outside a solar system from an inner planet (to put this in perspective, from the sun to Pluto is 3.6 billion miles and one light year is 5.8 trillion miles)

Praeothmin · Post by **Praeothmin** » Thu Apr 26, 2007 12:00 pm

I was watching DS9 yesterday, and in the second season, in the episode "Whispers", we find that DS9's internal sensors can detect abnormal neural activity and telepathic activity in use.

Pretty darn impressive if you ask me... :)