If you are on your first playthrough of the game, I suggest that you DO NOT READ this post. This post contains information about late game side quest.

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Due to the very open nature of the game, you can find all kinds of useful items quite early, if you know where to look.

Something I found to be immensely useful on my first playthrough was the ARTX Propulsion Gen 2 chipset, which I found quite late into the game. It add's a jet pack to the booster system, making exploring the station much faster and easier. Especially during No Needles or Typhon only run where getting Mobility II upgrade isn't an option, this can save you a lot of time.

"Disgruntled Employee" Side quest spoilers bellow.

During this side quest, you are tasked to find one Grant Lockwood. If you do the quest like you are supposed to, you will need to get to Deep Storage to track him so you can find his body floating in space, quite far away from the station, with in the radiation zone. On his body, you will find the ARTX Gen 2 upgrade. However, it is entirely possible to find his body when you first go into the exterior from the Hardware labs. Now, i'm not 100% sure if this works every time due to Talos 1 moving around in space, but if fly to the Shuttle Bay airlock, orient yourself so that Arboretum is up, and start flying right, beyond the ring and into the radiation zone, you should see the "Human Corpse marker" in the distance. That's Grant Lockwood. If you don't find him, just fly full 360 around the station, while being near or within the radiation zone, and you should find him soon enough.

ta–da!, now you have Jetpack which makes exploration quite a bit faster, even before you have found the Psychoscope.