Starlink Roam

[sailingharry]

Originally Posted by jordanbigel

I had to google what H3 cells are - they appear to be StarLink defined hexagonal shaped regions which they've mapped the globe with. If they geo-blocked only dishes which are in one of the cells that are completely over water that would leave a lot of room for cruisers to operate SL in the near shore regions and at anchor.



But can't they pinpoint any dish's position to the accuracy of a GPS, down to the street (or bay)? Couldn't they literally block anyone who is over water?

I think they COULD. I just don't see the business case. If they use the H3 cell (new term to me too) they get a crap ton of recreational users, using the same technology they already use for RV, while still locking in cruise ships for the ocean coverage. If they geo fence to the surf line, they lose all the recreational boaters and gain no new premium users.

One could argue that at this point in the rollout, recreational coastal sailors are a noticeable percentage of customers. Maybe small, but not insignificant. We have a use case that is stronger than rv's (although a smaller user pool, for sure).

[Franziska]

Dreaming is allowed

What would be probably acceptable for most would be to allow continue to allow RV use say within 10 nm from any shore or island.
That way you can be in remote places and still have web access.

Offshore most would need it for weather and the occasional phonecall.
So, it would be cool if you could buy a kind of time constrained offshore pass to temporarily have internet offshore.

Rebrand Maritime to Ship and keep selling it to anyone who really needs permanent access well offshore.

Probably not going g to happen, but my 50ct...

[steffan]

Originally Posted by sailingharry

I think they COULD. I just don't see the business case. If they use the H3 cell (new term to me too) they get a crap ton of recreational users, using the same technology they already use for RV, while still locking in cruise ships for the ocean coverage. If they geo fence to the surf line, they lose all the recreational boaters and gain no new premium users.

I agree. Defining a new geofence, maintaining it, fixing errors and dealing with exceptions, just so you can lose a bunch of existing customers, very few of whom will switch to maritime, makes no business sense. Roam accounts should be the highest margin since they are only soaking up excess bandwidth as it is.

[steffan]

Originally Posted by Franziska

Dreaming is allowed
Offshore most would need it for weather and the occasional phonecall.
So, it would be cool if you could buy a kind of time constrained offshore pass to temporarily have internet offshore.

Rebrand Maritime to Ship and keep selling it to anyone who really needs permanent access well offshore.

Probably not going g to happen, but my 50ct...

I believe that global Roam can't be paired with the in-motion dish yet. I could see them offering a low-bandwidth (or per-byte) on-the-water add-on to global Roam with that hardware. Restrict the bandwidth enough to avoid cannibalizing marine accounts and make some money off what's already dramatically under-utilized.

[bstreep]

We have "In Motion". We get 200mb downloads, and 40ms pings.

[chubby]

looks like mr musk and crew have (finally) took their energy off perfecting the fart sounds in my car...and are now starting to focus themselves on realizing ripe markets with starlink.




the price of Starlink's offshore Maritime has dropped in price (significantly) down to $1000/mo. ($2500 for hardware)










..previously it was $5000/mo. with a $5000 hardware cost


me thinks if they can get it down a bit more to $500/mo..it would be ubiquitous on recreational offshore vessels.

[rslifkin]

Originally Posted by chubby

looks like mr musk and crew have (finally) took their energy off perfecting the fart sounds in my car...and are now starting to focus themselves on realizing ripe markets with starlink.


the price of Starlink's offshore Maritime has dropped in price (significantly) down to $1000/mo. ($2500 for hardware)


..previously it was $5000/mo. with a $5000 hardware cost


me thinks if they can get it down a bit more to $500/mo..it would be ubiquitous on recreational offshore vessels.

I think that's a slightly different offering than the $5000 package. This one appears to have some degree of data cap, and only uses 1 dish, not 2. So it's not as high performance.

[chubby]

when you say "data cap" did you mean speeds?...or a literal cap on data?



i do see the top speeds dropped from 350Mb/s down to 220Mb/s

[rslifkin]

Originally Posted by chubby

when you say "data cap" did you mean speeds?...or a literal cap on data?



i do see the top speeds dropped from 350Mb/s down to 220Mb/s

If you go to the "order" page, there are 2 options shown. Both at $2500 hardware cost. First option is $1000 / month and listed as "Commerical - 1TB". The second is $5000 / month and listed as "Premium - 5TB". I'm not sure if those are actual data caps or just a deprioritization threshold though.

[chubby]

Originally Posted by rslifkin

If you go to the "order" page, there are 2 options shown. Both at $2500 hardware cost. First option is $1000 / month and listed as "Commerical - 1TB". The second is $5000 / month and listed as "Premium - 5TB". I'm not sure if those are actual data caps or just a deprioritization threshold though.

ahh.. thanks for clarification (did not see that)

[jordanbigel]

Originally Posted by chubby

me thinks if they can get it down a bit more to $500/mo..it would be ubiquitous on recreational offshore vessels.

Still too dear for most of us, me for example. Most (most, not all) full-time cruisers are living on something between US$20k - $40k/year - at $500/month that's $6,000 or somewhere between 30% and 15% of total annual budget.

In my opinion, you won't see many takers among full time cruisers at these levels. Part-time cruisers maybe. At the current $150/mo the RV version costs $1,800/year which is more like 4% - 8% of total annual cruising budget - still a big hit, but manageable for many.

[PNWSalmon]

As we cruisers know, the coastline is not a cartoonish line that forms a perfect outline of a continent. The job of mapping what’s “water” and what’s “land” would have to incorporate cartography which could be pretty inaccurate in certain areas, and overall a somewhat monumental task. So, for “water” use for coast cruisers, I have very little doubt that the Roam product will continue to work for those within some distance of the shoreline.

Whether that’s a cell (logical) or some other arbitrary number, time will tell. Again, given the coastline, it’s not like you can just say “10 miles off shore” because it would be a question of 10 miles from what? And there you are incorporating marine cartography to determine the shoreline at your particular latitude and longitude, etc. It would seem illogical, as others have stated, to go through this effort.

As to in-motion use, it seems that they have found a happy cap at 10mph or whatever it is, and again, most coastal cruisers will not be impacted. So, pure speculation, logically it seems like nothing should change for coastal cruisers with Roam.

Now, as to those that are using Roam across the ocean and it’s working right now, I expect those days to end soon. Given that Roam has NO in-motion provision at all, this becomes a pain in the ass, if you want to use Starlink on a crossing, you’d have to rent a terminal for your crossing instead of just being able turn on “roaming” for 3 weeks, or whatever. For me that presents the biggest upcoming annoyance. And given starlink’s track record, they could make this change at any time they want, with no “warning” so if you are relying on Roam for an ocean passage you may be in for rude surprise.

[AA3JY]

https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/...-from-reality/

[Alistair242]

For us it is not yet an option. Our boat is in Queensland and we intend to sail north to Darwin and then up into Indonesia. I understand that there is not much coverage north of Rockhampton and zero coverage in Indonesia. In fact I read that they plan to provide service there sometime this year under license through a local telecom company at a higher rate. Not sure exactly what that means? We will stick with our reliable Iridium setup and cell data for now and revisit Starlink next year when up around Malaysia and Thailand.
Is anyone using Starlink in Asia or on the Indian Ocean? I read today that service is now available in the Philippines?

[Alistair242]

No, I see there is now coverage around Australia but not in SE Asia. Still not worth it for us to dive in until it is available in Indonesia and the rest of SE Asia and then across the Indian Ocean.