Starlink Broadband
Discussion
We don’t have 5G here, unfortunately, and the 4G signal is iffy.
I’m tempted to buy one of the booster boxes with an external antenna but I’m hesitant as they all seem to be sold by iffy companies with poor websites.
I get a very steady 250Mb/s at my flat in Amsterdam, and a quite unsteady 14Mb in London suburbia, which drives us mad, as both the wife and I remote in to the company’s machines from home, and between zoom meetings and trying to use Excel with a one second lag it’s doing our heads in.
I’m tempted to buy one of the booster boxes with an external antenna but I’m hesitant as they all seem to be sold by iffy companies with poor websites.
I get a very steady 250Mb/s at my flat in Amsterdam, and a quite unsteady 14Mb in London suburbia, which drives us mad, as both the wife and I remote in to the company’s machines from home, and between zoom meetings and trying to use Excel with a one second lag it’s doing our heads in.
Some discussion on the SpaceX thread a few weeks back about it from someone who has one
https://www.pistonheads.com/gassing/topic.asp?h=0&...
https://www.pistonheads.com/gassing/topic.asp?h=0&...
Northernboy said:
We don’t have 5G here, unfortunately, and the 4G signal is iffy.
n.
I'd suggest investing in some alternate network sims first - where we live only one network is reliable but its rock solid on 4g (its rural and 5G hasn't reached us). Not all mobile networks are equal.n.
Linus Tech Tips on Youtube has a really good video on STARLINK.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fh1a2K9ZgNA
Looks genuinely impressive from what their testing shows.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fh1a2K9ZgNA
Looks genuinely impressive from what their testing shows.
I've registered for beta and will certainly buy it. Fixed broadband barely works here, and we currently use an external 4G receiver and router for the house (max 35mb down, 2mb up) which is OK but unstable, especially upload.
Starlink will be expensive but a game changer for people living in rural locations but working at home.
Starlink will be expensive but a game changer for people living in rural locations but working at home.
clarkey said:
I've registered for beta and will certainly buy it. Fixed broadband barely works here, and we currently use an external 4G receiver and router for the house (max 35mb down, 2mb up) which is OK but unstable, especially upload.
Starlink will be expensive but a game changer for people living in rural locations but working at home.
It pisses me off that I need it here inside the M25, but I can’t put up with my existing service indefinitely.Starlink will be expensive but a game changer for people living in rural locations but working at home.
This post is brought to you by Starlink....
Have had it since early January down here in Devon. Still in Beta, with only about 10% of the intended number of satellites aloft at the moment. Speeds vary, but generally in the 120-170 Mbps range, but have seen 200 Mbps briefly. Currently the system is locked down so you can't configure the supplied router, but almost all of the processing is done in the dish (you can dispense with the router if you wish, and connect directly to the dish). Latency 30-40ms, which I gather isn't great for hardcore online gamers, but then they do have the option of getting a life instead.
As per Starlink's Beta blurb, the system is liable to brief dropouts - the dish supplies a statistics page showing current performance and a summary of outages over the past 24 hours, either by Obstruction (it thinks a satellite should be visible but can't see it) or Beta Downtime (something broke so they rebooted it) - mine currently showing a total of 4 minutes Beta downtime over the past 24 hours, and no Obstructed time. Beta downtime seems more frequent during the week - as they're probably actively working on it - and I've seen up to 40 minutes per 24 hours on a few occasions. Dropouts last typically 30 seconds or so, but they're enough to bugger up a Teams/Zoom/Skype call so I swap back to the current wired connection if I'm planning some of those. Dish is currently out in the middle of the lawn, and I bought the optional adapter to mount it on a 1 metre stainless steel pole to get it away from the ground, and planning on laying some conduit for the cable under the grass.
Still a risk that Starlink might go tits up commercially, and you'd be stuck with a £500 dish with no service, but technically the thing is a work of art and if they become a rarity could become a geek collectors' item one day - teardowns show they're probably costing SpaceX a lot more than £500 to produce, and Musk has been reported as saying getting the cost of the dish down is one of the largest technical challenges.
All in all, it's shiny, expensive and I don't really need it, even though it is substantially faster than the current BT wired link, but if you were really out in the sticks with genuinely rubbish broadband I'd say already a viable alternative. Plus shiny, if I didn't mention it.
Have had it since early January down here in Devon. Still in Beta, with only about 10% of the intended number of satellites aloft at the moment. Speeds vary, but generally in the 120-170 Mbps range, but have seen 200 Mbps briefly. Currently the system is locked down so you can't configure the supplied router, but almost all of the processing is done in the dish (you can dispense with the router if you wish, and connect directly to the dish). Latency 30-40ms, which I gather isn't great for hardcore online gamers, but then they do have the option of getting a life instead.
As per Starlink's Beta blurb, the system is liable to brief dropouts - the dish supplies a statistics page showing current performance and a summary of outages over the past 24 hours, either by Obstruction (it thinks a satellite should be visible but can't see it) or Beta Downtime (something broke so they rebooted it) - mine currently showing a total of 4 minutes Beta downtime over the past 24 hours, and no Obstructed time. Beta downtime seems more frequent during the week - as they're probably actively working on it - and I've seen up to 40 minutes per 24 hours on a few occasions. Dropouts last typically 30 seconds or so, but they're enough to bugger up a Teams/Zoom/Skype call so I swap back to the current wired connection if I'm planning some of those. Dish is currently out in the middle of the lawn, and I bought the optional adapter to mount it on a 1 metre stainless steel pole to get it away from the ground, and planning on laying some conduit for the cable under the grass.
Still a risk that Starlink might go tits up commercially, and you'd be stuck with a £500 dish with no service, but technically the thing is a work of art and if they become a rarity could become a geek collectors' item one day - teardowns show they're probably costing SpaceX a lot more than £500 to produce, and Musk has been reported as saying getting the cost of the dish down is one of the largest technical challenges.
All in all, it's shiny, expensive and I don't really need it, even though it is substantially faster than the current BT wired link, but if you were really out in the sticks with genuinely rubbish broadband I'd say already a viable alternative. Plus shiny, if I didn't mention it.
Edited by eharding on Monday 15th February 12:12
Northernboy said:
Thanks.
I like the idea of the new technology, and of talking to satellites, so it does have that in its favour.
I like the idea of having something in the garden, the innards of which look like they came off the front of an F-15, using a large phased array to track and communicate with multiple targets doing 17,000 mph up to 300 miles away. It really is very clever stuff. Plus if my £90 a month gets Musk & co to Mars a very tiny bit quicker, so much the better.I like the idea of the new technology, and of talking to satellites, so it does have that in its favour.
Gman20 said:
I suspect they are heavily vetting beta testers by looking at people's social media and other digital foot print, particularly early on.
You tweeted your isp's modem was a piece of s
t in 2009? sorry you're on the st list, you're not getting an invite till its well out of beta.
There wasn’t any mention of beta testing when I signed up, it looked to be just a normal order for the equipment and the service.You tweeted your isp's modem was a piece of s
t in 2009? sorry you're on the st list, you're not getting an invite till its well out of beta.Northernboy said:
Gman20 said:
I suspect they are heavily vetting beta testers by looking at people's social media and other digital foot print, particularly early on.
You tweeted your isp's modem was a piece of st in 2009? sorry you're on the st list, you're not getting an invite till its well out of beta.
There wasn’t any mention of beta testing when I signed up, it looked to be just a normal order for the equipment and the service.You tweeted your isp's modem was a piece of s
t in 2009? sorry you're on the st list, you're not getting an invite till its well out of beta.It might be worth downloading the Starlink app to check for obstructions to the overhead satellite view - it overlays the required area onto your phone's camera view - might be necessary to consider a roof mount (they were offering two types, a simple pedestal that you can attach to roof slopes of up to 40 degrees, and an hinged apex mount designed to be weighted down with blocks - the latter has disappeared from the order options on the Skylink portal, possibly because shipping to the UK was too expensive).
As for checking social media to vet beta customers, not sure about that. I did tell them to take my money so SpaceX can get to Mars faster in the beta signup comments section, which might have helped...
AJB88 said:
£89 a month no thanks.
Yes it is expensive, over £1000 a year plus £500 for the kit. I suppose if you need decent internet and you're stuck in the middle of nowhere, then it could still be good value. The market will dictate pricing, if they don't get enough subs then the price will need to come down. Time will tell. Other downside is the dish, it's big, needs line of sight so may end up on roofs, not ideal. Once there are more sats up there the size may come down, may be able to use a fixed dish that is less expensive.
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