No Man’s Sky – Repairing Your Scanner

Repairing Your Scanner

The first thing you should do is repair your scanner, as without it you’re essentially blind in terms of navigation, finding resources, etc. The game will tell you as much both in the lower right-hand corner and in your secondary quests if you pause and look at your quest log.

To do this, you need ferrite dust and the way to get that? Rocks. All the rocks scattered about, however tiny, can be mined for ferrite dust. As you do so, you will see the total number of ferrite tick upwards in the lower right, if this secondary objective has been selected in your Log screen. (Pause > Log.)

Note: The game is populated by Sentinels. Sentinels don’t like it when you mine their worlds. So it’s best to stay as far away from them as you can when mining. You can see them, hear them, and an icon will appear on your HUD when they are close enough to you, as well as a large directional indicator, telling you where they are. If they approach you, which they will do to investigate after you mine large objects or a lot of material, just stay calm unless they attack first.

If you don’t attack them, unless it’s a particularly hostile planet, you should be alright the first few times you mine. Even more so, if you stay out of their line of sight and detection range. If you continue to mine right in front of them, expect to be punished. Basically, treat sentinels as a stealth enemy you should avoid.

Some worlds have particularly hostile sentinels. You can always check the aggressiveness of sentinels in-game by pausing, and going to your Discoveries screen, and navigating (if it isn’t already displayed) to the planet you’re currently on. It will list information such as weather, Sentinels (typical, aggressive, etc.) how much conflict there is (peaceful, etc.) and this will let you know at a glance how rough a time you’re in for! Always scope it out.

If you start out on TOO rough an initial planet, don’t be afraid to start a new game, and “re-roll,” since your starting planet is selected randomly. With that out of the way, back to the Scanner.

Since you’re now mining, now is a good time to mention the mining laser overheat timing. On the upper right of your screen, when mining you will see a meter fill. If you continue mining beyond that point, you will overheat your laser and have to wait while it cools down. However, if instead, you release the mining trigger/button just as the meter reaches the maximum, it will instantaneously cool down, allowing you to mine almost uninterrupted. If you run out of charge entirely for your mining laser, you’ll need carbon to refuel it. More on that later.

Once you reach the amount of ferrite required to repair your scanner, enter your inventory, move to the Multitool screen (the multitool is your, as it sounds, multi-purpose tool in the game, scanner, miner, etc. all in one,) and mouse/cursor over it. Press the prompted key/button to repair, provided you have the required ingredients. Which you should after mining a small amount of ferrite dust from rocks.

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