A Jump Drive is a built-in system for Capital Ships, Black Ops Battleships, and Jump Freighters. It is an important system aboard these ships that allows them to move between systems without the use of Stargates. The Jump Drive allows Capital Ships to move directly between star systems, so it is possible to cover distances that would require a great number of jumps through the Stargate network to be covered in one or two activations of the Jump Drive. To use the Jump drive one must have either an active Cynosural Generator Array or an active Cynosural Field to jump to
This built-in system is not to be confused with the Jump Portal Generator module that can only be installed on Titans, or the Covert Jump Portal Generator for Black Ops Battleships.
There are a few limitations to Jump Drive technology, the first being that it requires a great amount of energy to make a jump. This energy is drawn from the ships Capacitor, and is between 95-71.5% of the ships total Capacitor capacity (Typically pilots assume 75%). Capital Ships are severely drained in capacitor in the few moments after making a jump due to this mass consumption of capacitor, making Capacitor Transfers on Carriers and Super Carriers or capacitor recharging modules (primarily Cap Recharger and Capacitor Power Relay) very useful to ships moving about.
The second limitation of the Jump Drive is that they require a certain fuel type to activate their jump drive. Since each Race's jump drive design is different, each requires a different fuel type.
Fuel requirements can be reduced by training the Jump Fuel Conservation skill.
Isotopes can be refined from ice-ores found in different areas of space, or simply bought off the market (listed under * Manufacture & Research → Ice Products)
Current Jump Drive technology in EVE has a limited range. The fuel requirement for a jump is proportional to the distance the ship is traveling (measured in Light Years, shortened to ly). In other words, the further you jump, the more ISK it costs. (Fuel usage can be reduced by the Jump Fuel Conservation skill, therefore reducing costs)
Different ship classes have different jump ranges with Carriers having the longest range, Black Ops Battleships and Titans the shortest. Jump range can be increased by the pilots Jump Drive Calibration skill, to a maximum of 2.25 times the base value at skill Level V. Training Jump Drive Calibration to Level V is seen as extremely useful and valuable, as coverage grows exponentially as radius increases. Training from IV to V is not as vital for Carrier pilots, especially those who are working with Dreadnoughts, as Carriers have the longest jump range even at Jump Drive Calibration IV.
Jump capable ships are normally only able to operate in low security (0.4-0.1) or 0.0 space. This is because CONCORD does not allow the use of a Cynosural Field Generator (see below) in systems of 0.5 security or higher, effectively keeping them out of empire space. The exception are Jump Freighters and Black Ops Battleships as they may use gates.
There are a few pilots found in High Security space with Carriers and Dreadnoughts as, in the distant past, the two types of ship could be built in High Security Stations, though this was later patched out. These ships have special rules handed down upon them, they are not allowed to so little as fit an offensive module, and cannot take part in any activities involving combat. If the pilot breaks these rules, they are temporarily banned and their High Security Capital Ships are moved to a random Low Security station.
'it is invulnerable' as long as you do not activate a module or start moving in any direction. You can press Ctrl and Space at the same time if you screwed up your Cynosural Beacon's placement on a station, and caused your ship to bounce off the station's model, without affecting the temporary invulnerability.