Tag: Starlink

How can Starlink improve their end-user equipment?

simonmackay 26/10/2023 Internet Access And Service, Network Management, Rural Broadband Access No Comments

Starlink satellite launch photo courtesy of SpaceX

Starlink could improve their satellite terminals further for advanced use cases

As I see Starlink build up its low-earth-orbit satellite Internet service, I would need to see them provide services that can answer particular user needs better.

But I would see Starlink offer these kinds of improvements as they refresh their consumer equipment or whenever there is competition afoot. This could be in the form of Amazon’s Project Kuiper constellation or the OneWeb constellation that will be offered through a variety of telcos and ISPs.

A satellite terminal that provides a WAN connection to the customer

At the moment, the Starlink terminals offered in the retail marketplace have a built-in Wi-Fi-only router. But I would like to see them offer terminals with a “WAN-level” Ethernet output that allows the terminal to work with an external broadband router.

TP-Link Archer AX6000 Wi-Fi 6 broadband router product picture courtesy of TP-Link USA

Using Starlink with advanced routers like the TP-Link Archer AX6000 Wi-Fi 6 broadband router

This may suit a range of consumers who need a better router than what Starlink builds in to their own terminals. Firstly, there are business users who would prefer to use business-grade equipment that offers what they need for their Internet connection such as VPN endpoint functionality or business-grade Wi-Fi segments that implement “enterprise-level” features. It can also encompass the use of routers that are optimised for offering public-access Internet service or even the use of high-performance routers for activities like online games.

There is an increasing range of multi-WAN routers that have two or more WAN / Internet sources, whether that be through an integrated modem like a cellular modem or an Ethernet connection. These arrangements would come in to their own for fail-safe Internet connections or to provide load-balancing or increased throughput (“fat-pipe” operation) for the Internet connection.

Add to this the use of distributed Wi-Fi systems that have one of the modules working as a router while the other devices work akin to an access point. This would come in to its own with larger rural and remote properties where there is a desire to assure property-wide Internet and home-network access. Various standards like Wi-Fi EasyMesh and some newer Wi-Fi variants pitched for long-distance networks could lead to innovation when it comes to rural-property Wi-Fi coverage.

This could be facilitated with a modem-router satellite terminal that has at least one Ethernet port and supports a “modem” or similar operating mode. Such a mode would then support the use of an external router.

At least one Ethernet LAN connection on modem-router satellite terminals

Having Ethernet on Starlink satellite terminals could allow them to work with NAS storage devices and similar devices

There are uses who would rather benefit from having a wired LAN segment as part of our home networks. This would require at least one Ethernet LAN port on the router. Some of the use cases would include NAS devices, smart TVs, desktop computers and the like or creating a multi-building home network which may appeal to a lot of farmers with barns and the like.

The pleasure-boat user class could also benefit from Ethernet LAN connectivity especially where there are marine electronics devices that handle large amounts of data like marine radar or electronic mapping systems. I would also extend to this network-connected AV equipment used on board a cabin cruiser, narrowboat or similar vessel where such vessels have at least one living area like a saloon where a TV with online-video services may be installed. Here, this user class can then benefit from a vessel-wide Ethernet network segment that answers all of these needs.

This user class could be served by either a satellite terminal that provides a WAN-level Internet connection that is used with a broadband router that has at least one Ethernet LAN port. Or a satellite terminal that provides at least Ethernet LAN connection in addition to Wi-Fi as has been done with most modem-router products.

Factoring in mariners who only do limited sailing

Starlink could offer better tariffs for people who use boats on inland waterways, on neighbouring islands or on their continent’s coast.

There are a significant number of mariners who sail only within inland waterways like lakes and rivers or sail along a small portion of their home continent’s coastline such as within a bay or estuary. It may also extend to people who sail a short distance between islands or from a continent to its neighbouring islands.

At the moment, such mariners who want to benefit from Starlink are asked to pay dearly for their service because it is assumed they intend to go to the oceans. This is even if they are just after a water-resistant marine-friendly modem for their craft while working within the inland waters or similar areas.

What could be looked at is a reasonably-priced service price tier for Starlink services used on small pleasure craft working within certain waterway classes like inland waterways, bays and estuaries, archipelagos of islands or close to the coastline. This factors in most pleasure-craft users who own reasonably-priced vessels with limited navigation abilities rather than those using more expensive craft like superyachts that have wider navigation abilities. As well, it could be about small-time fishing boats, scientific-research craft and the like being able to benefit from Starlink satellite broadband Internet. It could even factor in those of us who keep these boats tied up at a marina as a “holiday house” but take them out on the water on occasions.

Conclusion

These kind of options could come about as an increase in competition starts to exist between low-earth-orbit satellite operators. Here, it would manifest in a variety of hardware for these systems or an increase in the number of reasonably-priced consumer tariffs for these services.

They could also make satellite Internet appeal to an increased range of users who exist in regional, rural and remote areas including the waters.

Starlink to offer portability for their satellite platform

simonmackay 26/06/2022 Current and Future Trends, Internet Access And Service, Rural Broadband Access No Comments

Article

Starlink to allow semi-portable use of their satellite terminal

Starlink Internet Will Now Let You Take Your Dishy on the Go (gizmodo.com.au)

My Comments

Starlink is offering the ability to use your Starlink dish terminal and Internet service in a transportable manner around the same continent.

Here, this will be offered as an extra-cost feature to your subscription with costing USD$25 per month. You can enable and disable this feature as required which can come in to its own with those of us who use Starlink when camping or caravanning during the holiday seasons, or when running a temporary remote worksite.

The requirements for Starlink’s portability feature include:

The device to be used within the same continent as the registered address of service and to be within Starlink’s coverage footprint
To change the registered address of service if you are away from your current service address for more than two months
To use the Starlink terminal in a stationary location rather than in a vehicle or craft that is in motion

.. to come in to its own with caravans and boats and similar scenarios

You will expect best-case performance at the location you are temporarily using Starlink at because this low-earth-orbit satellite system is currently engineered to prioritise uses who have registered their Starlink service at that location.

The fact that the Starlink setup is not fully mobile and requires you to have equipment stationary while in use would come in to its own with certain use cases. For example, a recreational-vehicle or boat user who moves around would set up their Starlink setup when they have set up camp or moored their boat and only while they are at that location. Similarly a temporary mobile office would set up their Starlink terminal when they have arrived at where they want to work at.

There doesn’t seem to be any information about permanently installing a Starlink dish terminal in a vehicle, transportable building or boat. This approach may satisfy those of us who regularly take that vehicle, building or vessel to a particular location but want to reduce the number of tasks required to set oneself up at that location.

Another question that will come up regarding the “same continent” rule is whether islands that are located close to the continent but are politically separate from that continent are considered thus, even though they have Starlink service. This may be of concern where the island or islands are separated from the content by a day or overnight trip in a car ferry or, in the case of UK and France, a short train trip through a tunnel.

There is still the intent to offer a fully-portable service where the Starlink satellite Internet service can be used in a moving vehicle or vessel. This may have to be initially offered as an inland / coastal service relative to a continent which may satisfy most use cases like trains and coaches moving across a country or boats that are “under way” in inland or coastal waters.

I suspect that this will come about when Starlink is offered in more areas as an Internet backbone for general public-transport situations like air travel, cruise ships and long-distance trains.

German government subsidises Starlink satellite Internet

simonmackay 08/06/2021 Current and Future Trends, Internet Access And Service, Rural Broadband Access No Comments

Article

German government to subsidise satellite Internet installations for Starlink and similar setups at the consumer end

Germany to subsidise Starlink subs | (advanced-television.com)

Germany readies subsidies for satellite internet providers such as Starlink | Reuters

My Comments

The rise of low-earth-orbit satellite technology to enable decent Internet service for regional, rural and remote parts of the world has gained a bit more traction.

This time, it is the German Federal Government (Bundesregierung) with its Transport ministry who are subsidising Starlink installations across rural Germany. The US’s FCC has engaged in some form of subsidisation for Starlink but this is at a corporate level as part of their US-government-based program for enabling decent rural Internet service there.

The German approach is to provide EUR€500 towards Starlink hardware purchase for installation in Germany’s rural areas. This doesn’t just apply to Starlink but to any satellite or other radio-link-based Internet service provided on a retail level. It is intended to be consumer-focused and provider-agnostic in the same manner as what is expected for the provision of broadcasting and telecommunications in modern Germany.

It doesn’t apply to ongoing service costs that customers pay to keep the service alive. In the case of Starlink, the monthly service costs are EUR€99 / month at the time of writing.

German countryside - By Manfred&Barbara Aulbach (Own work) [CC-BY-SA-3.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0) or GFDL (http://www.gnu.org/copyleft/fdl.html)], via Wikimedia Commons

.. to improve access to real broadband in German rural areas

This was just announced as Tesla were about to commence work on building its European Gigafactory near Berlin and was riding on the fact that Tesla and SpaceX Starlink are owned by Elon Musk. The Bundesregierung need to seek approval from all of Germany’s 16 Federal States for this retail-level subsidy to go ahead.

The question that will come up is whether public subsidies for satellite or other radio-based Internet service is the way to go to bring decent broadband Internet to rural areas. This is compared to current efforts by local or regional governments in cohort with local chambers of commerce to bring fibre-optic Internet to rural and regional areas.

There will also be the issue of whether to extend this kind of subsidy to people living in boats along Germany’s inland waterways. Think of retirees who have riverboats on the Rhine, Elbe or Wupper rivers or cabin cruisers on the likes of Lake Constance (Bodensee).

Personally, I would see Starlink and similar technology come in to play for sparse rural areas while fibre or similar deployments are considered for more dense settlements. The long fibre-optic trunk link between towns or to serve a remote employment / industry area should never be forgotten as a way to encourage economic growth along its path.

At least Germany is taking another approach to dealing with the rural Internet deficiency issue by subsidising the installation of Starlink and similar technology in its rural households.

Project Kuiper about to compete with Starlink

simonmackay 06/05/2021 Current and Future Trends, Internet Access And Service, Rural Broadband Access No Comments

Articles

Amazon’s Kuiper low-earth-orbit satellite service could compete with Starlink very soon

Bezos vs Musk: Let battle commence | (advanced-television.com)

Musk Vs. Bezos: The Battle Continues – SatNews

Previous Coverage about low-earth-orbit satellite Internet

Low Earth Orbit satellites to improve rural broadband opportunities

My Comments

Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos has on the 21 April 2021 made his Project Kuiper low-earth-orbit satellite effort ready to launch. This, like OneWeb, will be in competition to the SpaceX Starlink low-earth-orbit satellite effort driven by Elon Musk of Tesla fame.

This will be about providing affordable reliable credible satellite broadband Internet service primarily to rural and regional areas.

Initially the satellites will be launched using Atlas V rockets owned by the United Launch Alliance that is established by Boeing and Lockheed Martin. But Amazon are wanting to work with other space-tech consortia like Arianespace, Bezos’s own Blue Origin company or Elon Musk’s SpaceX company.

The Kuiper constellation consists of 3236 satellites that work at an orbit of 590-630 km. The customer’s installation for the Kuiper setup will be based around a 12” flat-dish antenna, something equivalent to the size of an LP vinyl record. It will be about making such equipment affordable and portable for most users.

But Musk’s Starlink service has a head start with coverage of the Earth, Earth-station installations and service licensing in a significant number of countries. As well Starlink even has got going with seeking regulatory approval for mobile equipment intended to be installed in road and rail vehicles, maritime vessels and aircraft.

But to achieve the desireable amount of competition for the satellite Internet service, there will be a significant number of hurdles. There will be the launch frequency issue i.e. how frequently Jeff Bezos can get satellites in to space to cover the Earth. There is also the issue of establishing ground stations and licensing end-user device designs and legitimately providing service in many jurisdictions. It also includes the design and licensing of mobile stations for installation on vehicles, vessels and aircraft to allow use of Kuiper on the move.

Both the tech visionaries are in a bitter fight to the end with the FCC regarding licensing of satellites and similar technology. But when in full flight, expect competitive service and low prices for broadband at your bush block.

I do still see a significant number of questions come about regarding low-earth-orbit satellite broadband in its current form. Firstly, there needs to be a wide variety of customer equipment that suits different use cases, such as satellite modems that work with broadband routers that have Ethernet WAN connections,

There will have to be the issue of assuring the legitimacy of satellite-broadband service within peri-urban rural areas. These are the rural areas that form the hinterland of a city or large town and some of these areas do not have access to broadband service of a decent standard due to the settlements being relatively sparse. Here, if there is a requirement to assure “rural-only” service for a satellite-broadband service, the peri-urban areas could be deemed legitimate based on the absence of wired or terrestrial wireless broadband service providing a minimum bandwidth.

Similarly there will be the issue of facilitating mobile and portable satellite broadband services whether to serve campers or to serve airlines offering inflight Wi-Fi. For countries with international land borders or airlines and ships that offer international transport, it will encompass providing mobile satellite broadband on an international form.

But what I see of the Starlink and Kuiper efforts is that they are about providing decent and affordable broadband service to rural and remote areas of the world. This year could effectively be the year of a race for this goal.

Low Earth Orbit satellites to improve rural broadband opportunities

simonmackay 02/04/2021 Current and Future Trends, Internet Access And Service, Rural Broadband Access No Comments

Starlink and similar satellites could give satellite broadband more credibility (Credit SpaceX)

Article

Report: Satellite broadband market to triple | (advanced-television.com)

How Is Low Earth Orbit Changing Satellite Internet? – X2nSat

Elon Musk’s Starlink poised to shake up Australia’s broadband (smh.com.au)

Low-Earth-Orbit satellite operators

OneWeb

Starlink

My Comments

A consistent problem associated with bringing broadband Internet to rural and remote places is the cost and time involved in bringing these services there. But there have been various efforts by public and private sector entities to implement satellite broadband to serve this need.

Most of these have distinct disadvantages such as the equipment and service being very costly and a lot of these services not offering great bandwidth and latency. Let’s not forget that the deployment of this technology isn’t all that scaleable.

The COVID-19 coronavirus plague has underscored how dependent we are on Internet connectivity for our business and social lives. The role of rural areas has even been underscored with these areas gaining increased appeal to live or do business within because of the pandemic. A recent Euroconsult report has stated that satellite broadband will gain its value over the next decade as a way to enable access to the Internet from remote areas.

The new low-earth-orbit satellites

Yorkshire Dales By Kreuzschnabel (Own work) [CC-BY-SA-3.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0), GFDL (http://www.gnu.org/copyleft/fdl.html) or FAL], via Wikimedia Commons

… allowing more rural and remote areas to gain real broadband

But a new form of satellite broadband is being pushed out at the moment. This is based on low-earth-orbit satellite technology which uses a very large constellation of satellites that are closer to Earth than traditional satellite technology. This improves on latency and on bandwidth available to the end users.

Silicon Valley visionaries like Mark Zuckerberg and Elon Musk have been behind this technology in order to have Internet all over the world, even in the remotest areas thereof.

But Elon Musk has got this idea off the ground with Starlink which is a subsidiary of his SpaceX venture. Most of his constellation of Starlink satellites are in orbit now while he has more being manufactured and set up for launch. The service is in beta testing for the USA, UK, Ireland, New Zealand and Germany at the time of writing but more areas are expected to be covered soon. They have also started establishing their presence in Australia.

Elon Musk’s service isn’t just for rural and remote areas at the moment. He is seeking FCC type approval for equipment that is to be installed on vehicles, ships and aircraft and to be operated while the vehicle, vessel or aircraft is moving. This is to court the provision of Internet service aboard the likes of commercial jets, the merchant navy and long-distance land transport. Who knows when Musk will then have consumer equipment designed to facilitate ad-hoc use of Starlink from caravans, motorhomes or remote camping locations.

Another service being pushed out at the moment is the OneWeb service that is pushed out by a UK and Indian consortium. Let’s not forget that Amazon is working on their Project Kuiper low-earth-orbit satellite service but they want to make sure everything is perfect before a single satellite is launched.

The idea of having many satellites is being made feasible with reuseable rockets like the Falcon 9 SpaceX rocket, which effectively reduces the cost of launching many spacecraft.

What I see of the low-earth-orbit satellite constellations is that they are intended to be viable competition in the satellite-broadband Internet service space. This could allow the idea of cost-effective high-throughput low-latency broadband to be made available to rural and remote areas or long-distance transport applications.