question:  Why had the owners of Little Probe obtained the E.P. Locator at such a discounted rate?
context: EVERYTHING IT HAD WAS IN THE GARDEN BY R. A. LAFFERTY [Transcriber's Note: This etext was produced from Worlds of If Science Fiction, March 1961. Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.] Naturally they did not get results at once, nor did they expect to; it required a fine adjustment. But they were disappointed that they found nothing for several hours as they hovered high over the rotation. There was one more test to run, one very tricky and difficult of analysis, that with the Extraordinary Perception Locator. But this might be so varied or so unfamiliar that often both the machine and the designer of it were puzzled as to how to read the results. The E. P. Locator had been designed by Glaser. But when the Locator had refused to read Positive when turned on the inventor himself, bad blood developed between machine and man. It was for this reason that Glaser used that model no more, but built others more amenable. And it was for this reason also that the owners of Little Probe had acquired the original machine so cheaply. And there was no denying that the Extraordinary Perception Locator (or Eppel) was a contrary machine. On Earth it had read Positive on a number of crack-pots, including Waxey Sax, a jazz tootler who could not even read music. Yet on Suzuki-Mi it had read Positive on a two-inch-long worm, only one of them out of billions. For the countless identical worms no trace of anything at all was shown by the test. He then narrowed to a smaller area (apparently one individual, though this could not be certain) and got very definite action. So among the intelligences there was at least one that might be extraordinary, though possibly in a crackpot way. The Little Probe hovered stationary in the light and the moon-town came up under the dawn. Timidity has never been an efficacious tool with us." And you, my good man, what is your handle, your monicker, your tag?"
output:  The designer had no longer used it as it had not detected E.P. on himself.
options:  The readings were unclear as it had struggled with detecting E.P on worms.  The designer had no longer used it as it had not detected E.P. on himself.  It was a faulty machine and often shut off without notice.  It often produced an orange light meaning it was unsure of the results.