was that MSR was designed to have a low terminal velocity and to impact without a parachute. Genesis was designed to use a parachute and when that failed, a lot of damage was done. IIRC, Genesis hit at roughly 200 MPH compared to MSR's design terminal velocity of 70 MPH or so. The difference in kinetic energy is roughly a factor of 9 greater for Genesis than for MSR. Genesis was designed to return some extremely fragile samples to the Earth, so it needed a parachute. MSR was designed to return dirt.
Genesis was further proof (as if any were needed) that the more complicated something is, the more things there are to go wrong. As Bill Lear directed to his engineers when they were designing the first Learjet (the Model 23): "If you don't have the system, you don't have to worry about its backup."
Space/Science » in reply to We've lost the original formula for carbon-phenolic
The biggest difference between Genesis and the MSR proposal