the FAQ says it needs to use the internet 'abuot 5 minutes at a time' every few days.
The reason is that each download of data is very small (maybe 200-500 Kb) but requires great computing power to process, so one download will take a few days to be done with.
It's all fully automatic and works away unnoticed, you don't have to do anything. Oh and the screen saver version displays some really cool graphics of the signals on a 3D graph & what's being processed.
N.B. looking forward to some competition. I'll see if I can squeeze some more CPU out of the 2200+ athlon and be the fastest Mercedesshop extra-terrestrial finder
EDIT: Search the user groups for 'merc'. Mercedes-Benz USA has a group. They've got 13 members and done 52 years of CPU time. group founder: ML "500" Rotolo
EDIT AGAIN: And what's this?!
Team Mercedes-Benz W124