Starlink

[scootr]

Even the residential service slowed noticeably on Sunday evening /night with a peak use warning popping up on my speed test screen. Switch the main PC to an ethernet cat 5 cable connection via the adapter that arrived yesterday. I see a noticeable DL speed increase with the E cable vs Wifi... this was expected. (hoped for)

Overall an improvement over the cellphone service for less! I'm happy
Next step permanent roof install and wall penetration.

 

[NoTrespassing]

Another reason for us to go with "Best Effort" Starlink service is that we can update our 2 gaming consoles during off peak hours. As it is now, whenever a console or game needs a large update, I take both consoles to a neighbors house about 1/2 mile away that has cable and do the updates. I feel awful having to do that but the downloads required are sometimes over 10 gbit and full games can be 60 or 90 gbit. Our entire month's allotment is only 145 gbit for Netflix and 2 gaming consoles. I'm hoping with "Best Effort" Starlink the speeds will be ok at 2am.

Kevin

 

[BigBlue1]

So WoodChuck, you opted in to "Best Effort"? My concern is it says "no gaming". My son and I use cell phones to game now and it's not good. I'm wondering if SL is just saying speeds will be slow at certain times so they won't be optimal for gaming or they can specifically block things like XBox. Our dl speeds can be as low as 1 mbps with fairly high latency and gaming is difficult with CP. I guess I'm willing to purchase SL if they don't specifically block us from gaming on it.

During times of peak network congestion, Best Effort users will experience notably slower speeds than Residential users. Best Effort users will be able to engage in typical internet activity like email, online shopping, or streaming a n SD movie, but they won’t be able to engage in activities like online gaming, video calls or streaming 4K and HD movies.
Outside times of peak network congestion, Best Effort users can expect to engage in all of the above activities and more , but speeds will be slower than Residential users.

SERVICE PACKAGE	Service Availability	Latency (ms)	Expected Download (mbps)	Expected Upload (mbps)	Allowable Data

STARLINK	≥99%	20-40	50-200	10-20	No Data Caps
BUSINESS	≥99%	20-40	100-350	10-40	No Data Caps
BUSINESS (CIRCULAR HARDWARE)	≥99%	20-40	100-300	10-40	No Data Caps
STARLINK FOR RVs	≥99%	20-40	50-200; 5-100*	10-20; 1-10*	No Data Caps
MARITIME	≥99%	<99ms	100-350	20-40	No Data Caps
BEST EFFORT	≥99%	20-40	5-100	1-10	No Data Caps

It looks like to me from the above, they are just saying gaming performance will be poor in peak times which it already is on our cell phones.

Kevin

I'm confident they are just cautioning customers about potential challenges. They aren't going to actively block certain traffic types.

 

[kf4uda]

Hardware is here. That was quick. Came in 2 days early. Unfortunately I probably won't get to set it up until the weekend. Maybe after the weekend I will have some feedback on their "best effort" service.

 

[cjoffutt]

Another reason for us to go with "Best Effort" Starlink service is that we can update our 2 gaming consoles during off peak hours. As it is now, whenever a console or game needs a large update, I take both consoles to a neighbors house about 1/2 mile away that has cable and do the updates. I feel awful having to do that but the downloads required are sometimes over 10 gbit and full games can be 60 or 90 gbit. Our entire month's allotment is only 145 gbit for Netflix and 2 gaming consoles. I'm hoping with "Best Effort" Starlink the speeds will be ok at 2am.

Kevin

This was one of a few determining factors to get the Best Effort plan as well. Add in the fact I won't lose my spot completely is another. Hopefully where I'm at my speeds are not reduced at all.

However, I'm curious would would happen if I swap equipment with my parents that have full blown residential service. They are only around for half the year and live 5 miles away. Would it allow me to use it to full potential and they would have BE until 'mine' became full residential? Or would it detect that the dish/router were moved to a new GPS location and cause larger issues.

Hopefully BE plan will give me enough of a consistent speed to where we can drop Dish Network and just stream and/or download what we normally watch.

 

[scootr]

Everybody stop subscribing please. The signal is spread thin enough

 

[BravoXray]

Even the residential service slowed noticeably on Sunday evening /night with a peak use warning popping up on my speed test screen. Switch the main PC to an ethernet cat 5 cable connection via the adapter that arrived yesterday. I see a noticeable DL speed increase with the E cable vs Wifi... this was expected. (hoped for)

Overall an improvement over the cellphone service for less! I'm happy
Next step permanent roof install and wall penetration.

Most people don't know that Ethernet is faster than WiFi.
Much more secure too.

 

[scootr]

Most people don't know that Ethernet is faster than WiFi.
Much more secure too.

It only makes sense, digital data converted to air waves, transmitted, converted back into digital data... would be slower than say >
straight digital transfer

 

[BigBlue1]

Most people don't know that Ethernet is faster than WiFi.
Much more secure too.

Typically faster, for sure. But the secure part isn't a given. Traffic on WiFi is almost always encrypted in standard home and business networks. Unless you're connecting to a password-less 'guest' network in a hotel/restaurant all traffic is encrypted and a password is required to join the network. Ethernet isn't encrypted by default (sure, TLS/SSL connections are often used, but that is dependent upon the client/server, not the network) and no password is required to join the network with most home router setups - just plug in a cable.

As with anything, it all depends on what you're trying to protect and how well you configure all the parts of the communication. But don't just assume that a physical connection is more secure.

 

[geneb846]

Typically faster, for sure. But the secure part isn't a given. Traffic on WiFi is almost always encrypted in standard home and business networks. Unless you're connecting to a password-less 'guest' network in a hotel/restaurant all traffic is encrypted and a password is required to join the network. Ethernet isn't encrypted by default (sure, TLS/SSL connections are often used, but that is dependent upon the client/server, not the network) and no password is required to join the network with most home router setups - just plug in a cable.

As with anything, it all depends on what you're trying to protect and how well you configure all the parts of the communication. But don't just assume that a physical connection is more secure.

But stand outside my house and capture my ethernet.