cnbc SpaceX’s Starlink satellite internet service is priced at $99 per month, according to e-mail

[axipher]

Quote

SpaceX is expanding the beta test of its Starlink satellite internet service, reaching out via email on Monday to people who expressed interest in signing up for the service.

 

Known as the “Better Than Nothing Beta” test, according to multiple screenshots of the email seen by CNBC, initial Starlink service is priced at $99 a month – plus a $499 upfront cost to order the Starlink Kit. That kit includes a user terminal to connect to the satellites, a mounting tripod and a wifi router. There is also now a Starlink app listed by SpaceX on the Google Play and Apple iOS app stores.

 

“As you can tell from the title, we are trying to lower your initial expectations,” the emails said, signed Starlink Team. “Expect to see data speeds vary from 50Mb/s to 150Mb/s and latency from 20ms to 40ms over the next several months as we enhance the Starlink system. There will also be brief periods of no connectivity at all.”

 

Source

Edited October 27, 2020 by axipher

[Andrew]

Is it really surprising that it's not free and is no where near the original promised gigabit with sub-20ms latency?

 

Musk and his companies do this all the time, and every single time it seems the majority eats it up.

[axipher]

18 minutes ago, Andrew said:

Is it really surprising that it's not free and is no where near the original promised gigabit with sub-20ms latency?

 

Musk and his companies do this all the time, and every single time it seems the majority eats it up.

 

I honestly don't remember the original promised speeds from SpaceX themselves, but I can find this article talking about ~25 ms latency which they seem to have reached.

 

https://www.geekwire.com/2018/game-elon-musk-says-spacexs-prototype-internet-satellites-working-well/

 

 

Now that 25 ms latency could have very well been a one-way form satellite to ground meaning 50+ ms round-trip on top of the regular internet latency.  Starlink also has the possibility to allow for creating a internet back-link for general internet traffic to replace the need for some future under-sea cables as well.

 

I might have missed some articles around Starlink so lots could still change.

[UltraMega]

I saw three starlink satellites in a row go overhead a few months back. Very cool tech.

[ENTERPRISE]

Well it all has to start somewhere. I also did not see the initial speed estimate but I would have been skeptical on the 1Gbps considering it is still fledgling tech.

[schuck6566]

On 10/27/2020 at 10:44 AM, axipher said:

“As you can tell from the title, we are trying to lower your initial expectations,” the emails said, signed Starlink Team. “Expect to see data speeds vary from 50Mb/s to 150Mb/s and latency from 20ms to 40ms over the next several months as we enhance the Starlink system. There will also be brief periods of no connectivity at all.”

Source

Limited reports from very early domestic beta users of the partial satellite constellation in August 2020 suggested users experienced download speeds from 11 Mbps to 60 Mbps, and upload speeds from 5 Mbps to 18 Mbps. fune part will be trying to see past them all @ night... "On 20 November 2019, the four-meter Blanco telescope of the Cerro Tololo Inter-American Observatory (CTIO) recorded strong signal loss and the appearance of 19 white lines on a DECam shot. This image noise was correlated to the transit of a Starlink satellite train, launched a week earlier"

[axipher]

Soon we will have cameras with AI-Satellite Removal built-in

[schuck6566]

3 minutes ago, axipher said:

Soon we will have cameras with AI-Satellite Removal built-in

seriously,Space-x actually offered to "provide on-demand orientation adjustments for astronomical experiments, if necessary."

[schuck6566]

lol,Amazon wants to play..... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kuiper_Systems

[UltraMega]

It seems far fetched to me that star link satellites would really matter for astronomy. There are already close to 3000 satellites in orbit IIRC, and they're not an issue. The only way I can see it being an issue is when taking a really broad, not really zoomed in much image of the night sky but that would seem kinda pointless.

[axipher]

5 minutes ago, UltraMega said:

It seems far fetched to me that star link satellites would really matter for astronomy. There are already close to 3000 satellites in orbit IIRC, and they're not an issue. The only way I can see it being an issue is when taking a really broad, not really zoomed in much image of the night sky but that would seem kinda pointless.

 

I'm not an astronomer myself, but maybe with the lower orbit of that many satellites is the problem.

[UltraMega]

33 minutes ago, axipher said:

 

I'm not an astronomer myself, but maybe with the lower orbit of that many satellites is the problem.

If anything that should make them easier to avoid. 

 

Pretty much all ground based (non amature) telescopes have lasers that shoots out into the atmosphere to get a reading on atmospheric distortion and thus are able to use that info to compensate for the loss in clarity. There is just no way these systems will be affected by some additional 1000 satellites or so. 

Edited October 29, 2020 by UltraMega

[axipher]

45 minutes ago, UltraMega said:

If anything that should make them easier to avoid. 

 

Pretty much all ground based (non amature) telescopes have lasers that shoots out into the atmosphere to get a reading on atmospheric distortion and thus are able to use that info to compensate for the loss in clarity. There is just no way these systems will be affected by some additional 1000 satellites or so. 

 

Makes sense, I figured most "professional" telescopes would have light and noise rejection.

[schuck6566]

4 hours ago, UltraMega said:

If anything that should make them easier to avoid. 

 

Pretty much all ground based (non amature) telescopes have lasers that shoots out into the atmosphere to get a reading on atmospheric distortion and thus are able to use that info to compensate for the loss in clarity. There is just no way these systems will be affected by some additional 1000 satellites or so. 

HOW many do you think they plan on putting up? "The FCC approved the request in April 2019, giving approval to place nearly 12,000 satellites in three orbital shells: initially approximately 1,600 in a 550 km (340 mi) - altitude shell, and subsequently placing approximately 2,800 K_u- and K_a-band spectrum satellites at 1,150 km (710 mi) and approximately 7,500 V-band satellites at 340 km (210 mi).^[37]"

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Starlink

 

[UltraMega]

33 minutes ago, schuck6566 said:

HOW many do you think they plan on putting up? "The FCC approved the request in April 2019, giving approval to place nearly 12,000 satellites in three orbital shells: initially approximately 1,600 in a 550 km (340 mi) - altitude shell, and subsequently placing approximately 2,800 K_u- and K_a-band spectrum satellites at 1,150 km (710 mi) and approximately 7,500 V-band satellites at 340 km (210 mi).^[37]"

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Starlink

 

Ah, that is definitely more than I thought. Still, if birds or planes are not an issue, really no reason something much further out would be.

[iamjanco]

I imagine that once they've launched all their satellites successfully, some sort of redundancy will also be in place. I was just wondering about the possibility of problems that could be caused by micrometeorite and/or space debris impacts.

 

Not sure what the chance of that happening is, but it's probably something they've already thought about as well.

[UltraMega]

2 hours ago, iamjanco said:

I imagine that once they've launched all their satellites successfully, some sort of redundancy will also be in place. I was just wondering about the possibility of problems that could be caused by micrometeorite and/or space debris impacts.

 

Not sure what the chance of that happening is, but it's probably something they've already thought about as well.

Pretty sure the orbits of star link will be different from that of most major satellites. That said, nasa tracks all space debris in orbit down to things about the size of a marble and adjusts the path of any satellites when a collision is possible. 

 

Years ago China tested a missile by shooting a defunct satellite with it despite being warned about space debris. Nasa now ironically tracks the space debris left by that explosion and warns china when one of their satellites is in danger of a collision.

Edited October 30, 2020 by UltraMega

[schuck6566]

I give them credit,they have the debris issue pretty much covered.like 95%+ of the satellite is designed to burn up on re-entry.

[axipher]

8 hours ago, schuck6566 said:

I give them credit,they have the debris issue pretty much covered.like 95%+ of the satellite is designed to burn up on re-entry.

 

If I'm not mistaken, the main issues from the general public seem to be amateur astromers having to deal with all the extra light trails from all the new low-orbit satellites, and potential space debris from the satellites that they lose control of and can't bring in to the atmosphere to burn up in a controlled manner.

It does seem like SpaceX rushed a lot of the Starlink program and relies a lot more on trial and error then lots of pre-planning and simulations.

[Andrew]

6 minutes ago, axipher said:

It does seem like SpaceX rushed a lot of the Starlink program and relies a lot more on trial and error then lots of pre-planning and simulations.

Yeah, Musks companies do this a lot.

[UltraMega]

I don't think spaceX would have gotten approval to do this if their plan was trial and error. You don't do trial and error in space, it's far too expensive.

[UltraMega]

Came across this video, has some good info: