All things STARLINK

[goingbush]

Its official, you can now buy a Starlink kit for your Outback Touring rig and Pay as You go.
That is a game changer.

Starlink (https://www.starlink.com/rv)

Ive fitted my Starlink into the roof of my truck , & it works flawlessly , even on the move, but my Account is a Home Account and at this time there is no option to cancel / resume service as required or migrate to a RV account.
The new dish is rectangle , so I'll have to fix the hole in my roof and figure out a new mount.

Only bottom half of Australia is covered at the moment but that will change as more sats are deployed. Each time I look at the map it covers more land area.

I have an TP_Link access point in a pipe which can be raised on back of truck which gives a good 250m -300m of coverage around camp , only issue is don't camp under tree cover .

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[Homestar]

Hmmm, I've got plenty of real estate on the roof of my motor home... [bigrolf]

Edit - Not for $174 a month though...

[goingbush]

Hmmm, I've got plenty of real estate on the roof of my motor home... [bigrolf]

Edit - Not for $174 a month though...

it is expensive, but you only pay (by the month) as you use it, pause service when you get home, then resume for next trip.

[Homestar]

Thanks - I didn't see that shown anywhere - the website is surprisingly light on with detail. I just went to order it and it gave me a list of hardware, etc then the price per month.

[tc_s1]

Ordered and look forward to testing for 30 days to see if we keep it.

[RobMichelle]

Thanks - I didn't see that shown anywhere - the website is surprisingly light on with detail. I just went to order it and it gave me a list of hardware, etc then the price per month.

I couldn’t find the mobile component on the website [emoji853]

[goingbush]

I couldn’t find the mobile component on the website [emoji853]

Starlink Use in Motion is not an official feature (at the moment) , To enable it you need to disable the motors & mount horizontal .

The previous USA Terms and Conditions expressly forbid use in motion & voids warranty , The Australian T & C never mentioned use in motion, The Use in motion clause has now been removed from the USA T&C , Starlink seems to be very progressive and adopts a lot of user group suggestions, details & options are very fluid.

[goingbush]

To mount the rectangle dish horizontal for use in motion does require a degree of hacking, literally .
most people use as intended, set up at camp on the supplied tripod mount . The old Round dish was easier as it could be easily deconstructed, not so much the new rectangle one.

here are some images of mount ideas from the ESIM (Earth station in motion) user group.
the one in the thule style rooftop box would be easy if you already carry one of those things.



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[Pedro_The_Swift]

Hmm.....

Hard to sell to the Minister of Finance when we are in the half of the country that it doesnt cover....

[Homestar]

Hmm.....

Hard to sell to the Minister of Finance when we are in the half of the country that it doesn't cover....

It says 'Coming soon' to the other bit of Oz, so that's the sales pitch. [biggrin][bigwhistle]

[goingbush]

Hmm.....

Hard to sell to the Minister of Finance when we are in the half of the country that it doesnt cover....

I expect its likely working in the northern part of Australia for RV, just not for Residential until its fully deployed, especially if laser linked satellites are flying overhead , tprobably waiting to hook more ground stations up, the ground station beams internet to the sat then down to you , laser linked satellites will relay internet from another , is how aircraft flying over sea works.

if you look at the map you see Ukraine is on the wait list, but its obviously working there as Elon has given them thousands of dishes.

Starlink (https://www.starlink.com/map)

[prelude]

I am definitely on the fence about this one. For one, I hate all those birds flying over ruining the night sky... but that is a rant for a different time I Guess.

The price is what gets me the most. It is pretty expensive and although you can pay per month of use, I would still need to drag that entire kit along. Anyone know how much it weighs? It is good to know that it is an option, but I'd rather be off grid when I go bush :) Still, when I need to do some work whilst traveling, this could be an alternative to buying a cell card with data everywhere...

I guess I'll need to start following this a bit closer.

Cheers,
-P

[Pedro_The_Swift]

this could be an alternative to buying a cell card with data everywhere...
Cheers,
-P

The only way to have "data everywhere" in OZ is via a satellite..... [wink11]

and--
Starlink 2.0 is just around the corner--
The owner says "its an order of magnitude better in every way"

[tc_s1]

I believe (though do not know with 100% certainty) that the current RV dishes will work and enjoy the benefits of the 2.0 upgrades when they come online. At the moment the 2.0 upgrades are delayed due to launch window and payload availabilities.
The only way to have "data everywhere" in OZ is via a satellite..... [wink11]

and--
Starlink 2.0 is just around the corner--
The owner says "its an order of magnitude better in every way"

[Epic_Dragon]

We got Starlink several months ago and LOVE it. Think the roaming option is fab really. We don't use that function.
All we could get at home before was mobile broadband that cost a fortune for limited gb, was extremely slow and would drop out constantly. Other satellite options were even more expensive and silly with limits, on/off peak

Enter Starlink. Isn't much more per month, unlimited and so fast!!! Don't know ourselves now! Everyone can stream at once, game! It's absolutely brilliant [emoji122]

[goingbush]

Starlink have now allowed existing equipment to be migrated to RV account.

So I have switched my old round dish onto the RV setup, and paused the subscription (which you can not do with a residential account). Will resume again when next we set off on an outback trip. This makes Starlink almost economical .

[Pedro_The_Swift]

When Starlink2 and the top half of AUS are both a GO,, we might pull the pin on this...

[prelude]

Perhaps I will make use of starlink, perhaps not. I intend to test it out this summer.

In any case, this youtuber has some pretty hard facts that don't add up soooo yeah. For your consideration:

DEBUNKING STARLINK - YouTube (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2vuMzGhc1cg)

Cheers,
-P

[Pedro_The_Swift]

Thanks for that,, but I simply dont care. If the whole house of cards that this vid alludes to only lasts 5 years so what? Thats 5 years of good internet in my van all over Oz.. by then the Oz government might wake up and put a decent geo stationary satellite up over us. [smilebigeye]

[goingbush]

I didn't watch the video but also don't care, It works better than anything else. Any technology we have now will be obsolete in 5 years, By then Starlink constellation will be fully deployed and antennas will continue to get smaller , could well have hand even have held phones.

[prelude]

Let me start by saying I fully agree. I made a similar decision regarding flex vs "solid" solar panels. Sure they'll only last me 5 years but I intend to only travel for 5 years and that fits my use case just fine.

If you watched the video however, you would know that in 5 years time they are not going to get the constellation up, more than likely it will never get finished or go bankrupt before gen 2 is even considered. In any case, if the initial up front cost is worth it, enjoy it while it lasts, certainly!

-P

[prelude]

So, I pulled the trigger (booked the whole setup as a business expense, I need to be able to work for my customers now don't I? :P) and got the "square" dishy and all.

I intend to do proper testing in 2 weeks time when I leave for a month through europe (including way up north between trees) to see what's what. For now, I must say it is almost boring. You plonk the unit down, it whizzes along, jump through some setup hoops and it just works. I left it out last night (underneath an awning even) and it just works. according to the stats I had 30 seconds of downtime.

A few observations thus far, the box in which the entire thing came stated it was 14kg. Exclude some light packaging material and I guess 13kg is left :) This, for me, is an enormous amount of weight that I do not have the GVM for. Also, the proprietary connectors are a shame as is the lack of an ethernet port, though you can buy a dongle for that.

Should we drag this thing along I will probably modify it be removing the entire base and back of the unit, removing the motors etc. and ditching the starlink router for a "normal" UTP cable and POE supply to make it way lighter, fixed into/onto the roof and use my own much smaller router.

Looking forward to this experiment!

Cheers,
-P

[Pedro_The_Swift]

The following info from a youtube vid with a vested interest in another product states---

"The paperwork in the states for "RV Starlink" says it will "de-prioritise" all RV internet for all other Starlink accounts."
also some concern over putting the mobile dish up and down every stop, apparently it comes with 81metres of cable?? maybe same dish as the other accounts? just on a stand with cable?

I really dont think that will be an issue in Uppkumbuctawest Australia...
ground stations might be though--
AFAIK starlink is still not using sat-sat linking even in the states, maybe this is in Version 2?

[W&KO]

Testing in the Kimberley…..

https://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/20220805/3831197e065b301f5ca4fccf20f645b0.png
https://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/20220805/f7187af796d425fe939c7cf8a5b2de76.png

[prelude]

Certainly not 81 meters of cable, dang :) I believe it to be 75ft, it is long though. Have not rolled it all out and measured it, just played with the setup outside and left it out for a night.

Like I said, modifying the unit seems to be fairlt straight forward. The cable used is just cat5e cable with proprietary plugs and you could modify one for your specific use. Since the cables can be bought separately there is not much harm in "modifying" one.

The latency is workable but certainly noticeable. Admittedly I use gigabit full duplex fibre at home but a long latency site (like aulro for example) get's progressively worse over starlink. Nothing that would be a permanent bother though.

My main concern for now is the weight of the setup, before modifications and the coverage (like being deprioritized in busy area's). If I am to bring this along I need to be able to work and not be shoved down a few mbit pigeonhole or have to wait for hours for the dish to do it's thing and find coverage.

We'll see. :)

-P

[goingbush]

I just spent the last 2 nights in a caravan park, parked under trees per photos and with the drenching rain of Southern NSW . I normally dont park under trees but I was stuck with that, Starlink worked through the obstructions,I did not notice any dropouts. My dish is embedded in the roof of my truck, I have it set up to work in motion , motors removed and flat mounted. Sure I was only getting 50mbps but it did what I need, typically get about 130-180 mbps on RV plan when parked out in the open

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[Pedro_The_Swift]

We could travel quite happily at 60mbs, most days (between towns) it hovers around one, if anything at all...

[goingbush]

Calls on Mobile Phones through Starlink, (without Starlink account or equipment) I though it was on the horizon but wow ,
So if your on T-mobile you can use your phone anywhere outside with a clear view of the sky

"TMobile said it will be included with their higher tier plans at no extra cost."

T-Mobile is a USA carrier , wonder which local provider will jump onto this game changer, probably be the end of traditional sat phones.

T‑Mobile Takes Coverage Above and Beyond With SpaceX ‑ T‑Mobile Newsroom (https://www.t-mobile.com/news/un-carrier/t-mobile-takes-coverage-above-and-beyond-with-spacex)

[JDNSW]

Note that it will require the local phone company to have rights to the necessary spectrum for each Starlink cell involved. Also, the total bandwidth per cell is going to be fairly small - meaning not much data per user, but texts and phone calls should be possible.

But the same applies to satphones, so as you say - end of satphones, at least within Australia, and potentially everywhere. But it will be a little while, and there is going to have to be a bit of sorting out of spectrum. For example, if Telstra has the right to use the necessary spectrum for their local tower, Optus users cannot use it for Starlink.

There are also likely to be legal issues - data is going to have to come back to Australia to allow the various legal requirements to be met (such as blocking banned websites and metadata retention etc).

And it will be at least next year - depends on Starlink 2 satellites, which are sort of dependent on the Starship booster, which has not yet flown to orbit and is having environmental issues with their launch site. (They can be launched on the F9 or falcon heavy, but apparently need modifications, which would be unnecessary expense if the Starship launches as planned, so probably won't happen.

[Robmacca]

Well... this causes me some doubts as to what direction to go in the interim for remote outback travel...

Satphone (expensive but not if Starlink is years away & not individually affordable for me) or iReach device in the interim... decisions... decisions.
I've got an old HV Radio in the shed but I doubt that is worth the $$ to fix/update, so in the interim - probably a Satphone until things change

[JDNSW]

A post today on Whirlpool estimates that the legal issues make it at least five years away, so I suspect the solution in this period will be a satellite phone.

[Milton477]

Does normal Wifi Calling work on Starlink like it does on ordinary NBN & cellular modems?

[Robmacca]

Does normal Wifi Calling work on Starlink like it does on ordinary NBN & cellular modems?

I'm lead to believe that is the case... but others might know more?

[goingbush]

Does normal Wifi Calling work on Starlink like it does on ordinary NBN & cellular modems?

yes, of course depends that your existing phone & provider allows wifi calling . My phone with Belong sim card does , my wifes identical phone on Southern does not , But if you have Skype you wont even need a simcard, just get Skype-out & put $25 credit on it & you can phone anywhere

[Milton477]

With wifi calling availability on Starlink, Sat phone costs can be spent on Starlink when it becomes available. The joys of taking the kitchen sink to the bush.

[Pedro_The_Swift]

Flat panel now available as "Marine", trying to work out if our 700w inverter will power it.. only special ethernet cable runs to panel, dedicated power supply needs 240v and uses 150w..

[goingbush]

You'd be spewing if you just bought one full price . This was on facebook,

My old early round dish is still working well on the truck.
I hear they have capped data limits now , not sure of the detail.




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[Vern]

Did a tesla powerwall install for a customer, who had starlink, I couldn't connect the powerwall to their starlink to commission it, had to hotspot it off my phone with telstra! [emoji1][emoji1]

[Epic_Dragon]

Do it [emoji38] it's AMAZEBALLS!!!!!
Got starlink at the start of thr year as only option here was mobile broadband that wasn't working, or would be very slow.
Best thing ever did was get starlink. I share it with my folks and sis.
It runs everything and barely ever has a hiccup
Also it is stupid fast

[Charliektm400exc]

I hear they have capped data limits now , not sure of the detail.


I’ve been researching Starlink and no data limits ATM

Charlie

[Homestar]

ATM is the correct usage by the looks of it. New T’s and C’s being introduced in the US show data limits are coming and capped speeds once they exceed this. It’s also becoming slow at times due to congestion.

There’s a snip of some info in this article - SpaceX'''s Starlink Quietly Mentions High-Speed Data Caps Are Coming for US Users (https://au.pcmag.com/networking/96983/spacexs-starlink-quietly-mentions-high-speed-data-caps-are-coming-for-us-users)

[JDNSW]

Don't forget the USA is far higher population than here, even in remote areas. I see data caps for cells outside the SE of Australia very unlikely.

Only issue I have with Starlink is the cost - I can't afford it.

[Epic_Dragon]

Its slow days still far exceed speeds of what is other options are available in rural areas.
Its worked without incident here in the craziest of weather too.
Had like 2 drop-outs but Starlink are extremely fast to fix those issues.

No caps here, thry will likely come eventually but I believe capped options means a cheaper monthly cost.
Its really targeted for those who are rural or wandering where other options are few or poor.
My old internet barely got 2mbps on its best days, no nbn etc available here. The slow days I've had on Starlink are Its still over 100mbps [emoji28]

[prelude]

It has been a while and I have completed most if not all of my testing:

My first observation is that Starlink availability seems to be hardcoded, that makes sense if you think about it but is a bit of a bummer. I was under the impression that availability was simply a map where you could order the stuff since they want to limit the amount of units in the field. The constellation is probably covering the entire planet already, just with more space between the satellites. However, when I passed the line drawn on the map in sweden a few months back it went from working like a charm to just staying offline and I am pretty sure I would have enough signal.

Second, and this is not a problem for australia admittedly, the fine print says that an RV user is only allowed to use the unit 2 months outside the country in which it is registered/purchased. You are supposed to change your address when you intend to go over those two months which is quite frankly not feasible. Like I said, australia is one big single country but here in europe I would technically not be able to use it when sitting out the winter in spain or something :)

Also, not only can you not use the service for more than 2 months outside the registration address borders, you can also only use it on the continent on which is was purchased. So, if you are thinking about taking starlink with you on a trip across new zealand or whatever, it probably won't work.

It is for these reasons that I have put my unit up for sale since there is no point in dragging it along around the world.

Finally, there are more changes made to the terms of service: in the US at least using starlink while moving is now allowed and a special dish can (must) be bought for it. They cost a whopping $2500 and with it, the other dishes firmwares are updated to no longer allow use while moving. Since this has not yet been rolled out outside the US afaik other users are still safe I assume, but I would prepare for this eventually happening all over the world.

-P

[Homestar]

Don't forget the USA is far higher population than here, even in remote areas. I see data caps for cells outside the SE of Australia very unlikely.

Only issue I have with Starlink is the cost - I can't afford it.

I think it’s just a matter of time - suck the user in, take their money then change things to make more money - it’s the natural order of things unfortunately these days. Also I wouldn’t trust anything that Musk has had anything to do with - you only have to buy a second hand Tesla to know you can’t have what the original owner had - without paying again.

Give it 12 months after the US and see what happens.

[peterjj]

Did a tesla powerwall install for a customer, who had starlink, I couldn't connect the powerwall to their starlink to commission it, had to hotspot it off my phone with telstra! [emoji1][emoji1]

our powerwall works fine with our starlink. (other issues with powerwall install but that whole other story)

[peterjj]

Its slow days still far exceed speeds of what is other options are available in rural areas.
Its worked without incident here in the craziest of weather too.
Had like 2 drop-outs but Starlink are extremely fast to fix those issues.

No caps here, thry will likely come eventually but I believe capped options means a cheaper monthly cost.
Its really targeted for those who are rural or wandering where other options are few or poor.
My old internet barely got 2mbps on its best days, no nbn etc available here. The slow days I've had on Starlink are Its still over 100mbps [emoji28]

ditto.
Makes working at home so much better.

[Tombie]

I think it’s just a matter of time - suck the user in, take their money then change things to make more money - it’s the natural order of things unfortunately these days. Also I wouldn’t trust anything that Musk has had anything to do with - you only have to buy a second hand Tesla to know you can’t have what the original owner had - without paying again.

Give it 12 months after the US and see what happens.

You'd be aware Gav that the same applied to Microsoft OS equipped computers? The licence applied to the original purchaser and if the system was sold the licence was (according to their blurb) non-transferrable. Its just that it was almost impossible to enforce.

[Homestar]

You'd be aware Gav that the same applied to Microsoft OS equipped computers? The licence applied to the original purchaser and if the system was sold the licence was (according to their blurb) non-transferrable. Its just that it was almost impossible to enforce.


I don't own a computer as such with Microsoft OS - always had a work laptop is all. Not sure why that makes it right for Tesla to disable multiple features - it just shows Microsoft are arse holes as well - which I think we pretty much all knew already.

2 wrongs doesn't make it ok - it's a **** act IMO

[W&KO]

Spotted this in my feeed today

https://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/20221107/109c6d346c9b84903be2d2a4e3942c29.png

[Pedro_The_Swift]

So there should be NO $$ premium for Tesla's that have a lot of E options..
the only difference in price is kays and condition?

[Homestar]

So there should be NO $$ premium for Tesla's that have a lot of E options..
the only difference in price is kays and condition?

Yep, in theory - no idea if it is like that in the real world - I wouldn't be running out to buy a second hand EV of any brand.

[Pedro_The_Swift]

For the DIY among us, the dish runs off 24v,, it gets this from the starlink modem, via their special cable.

[Tins]

Changing all the time:

182215

[Tins]

you only have to buy a second hand Tesla to know you can’t have what the original owner had - without paying again.



Where do you get that info from Gav? All the info I can find says the opposite, things such as FSD ( Paid option ) stays with the car, and is in fact a selling point. This only changes, possibly, if the car is taken back by Tesla themselves.


Does FSD transfer to my next car?

No. FSD is a feature that has been purchased for that car and it is not currently transferable to your next car.
FSD will however transfer with the car to the next owner and if you are selling a car with FSD enabled, the feature should add value to the car.
(Source: Tesla Full Self Driving FAQ (https://tesla-info.com/blog/full-self-driving-faq.php#:~:text=Does%20FSD%20transfer%20to%20my,ad d%20value%20to%20the%20car). )

[Homestar]

Where do you get that info from Gav? All the info I can find says the opposite, things such as FSD ( Paid option ) stays with the car, and is in fact a selling point. This only changes, possibly, if the car is taken back by Tesla themselves.


(Source: Tesla Full Self Driving FAQ (https://tesla-info.com/blog/full-self-driving-faq.php#:~:text=Does%20FSD%20transfer%20to%20my,ad d%20value%20to%20the%20car). )

Tesla Seems To Be Remotely Removing Features Such As Autopilot Functions On Used Vehicles | Carscoops (https://www.carscoops.com/2020/03/tesla-seems-to-be-remotely-removing-features-such-as-autopilot-functions-on-used-vehicles/)

And

Tesla's Removal Of Features On Used Cars Appears To Be In Violation Of Its Own Rules (https://jalopnik.com/teslas-removal-of-features-on-used-cars-appears-to-be-i-1842382846)

With a quick Google search. I wouldn't be relying on the manufacturer (Of any brand) to be transparent on such things, so I'm not surprised their blurb says what it does - it could be that their current policies are a result of the bad press when this all went down and they may not do it again, but I wouldn't trust them as far as I could throw Electric Jesus....

[W&KO]

Keen to fit one to the defender……

Struggling to find the spec sheet on the Aus page…..

[W&KO]

OK found the spec page….but it doesn’t actually mention In Motion…

[W&KO]

To mount the rectangle dish horizontal for use in motion does require a degree of hacking, literally .
most people use as intended, set up at camp on the supplied tripod mount . The old Round dish was easier as it could be easily deconstructed, not so much the new rectangle one.

here are some images of mount ideas from the ESIM (Earth station in motion) user group.
the one in the thule style rooftop box would be easy if you already carry one of those things.



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How much hacking is required?

We don’t have the room for the all the bits and pieces for the portable kit, be easier mounted to the roof rack.

[Tins]

OK found the spec page….but it doesn’t actually mention In Motion…

It's mentioned in the app, but it does say "in select markets", so we might be on the list. The rate it's going it may not be long.

182221

[Pedro_The_Swift]

there are utube vids showing how..

[Pedro_The_Swift]

Ordered.
RV. Flat HP.

Heaven help us...[bigwhistle]

[Pedro_The_Swift]

We just ordered the RV flat HP kit,, not sure about the difference??
Not really interested/see a need in using it while towing...

[Pedro_The_Swift]

The project after install is--

no doubt lots of Questions from me to you lot.. [wink11][bighmmm]
the process is simple enough..



https://www.outsidenomad.com/how-to-power-starlink-satellite-internet-on-12-volt-dc/

[Tins]

We just ordered the RV flat HP kit,, not sure about the difference??

If I read it correctly, the In Motion kit allows the "dish" to find and connect to more sats... Or perhaps it allows better crossover from one to the other. Not sure why, there seem to a few of the things up there.


Not really interested/see a need in using it while towing...

The only use I can think of would be if you needed to download large files, which could be done on the move... not sure what they might be[bigwhistle]

[Pedro_The_Swift]

The RV flat HP supposedly does all that too.... ?

[Tins]

The RV flat HP supposedly does all that too.... ?

Very likely. There are vids all over about people having internet service at speed with their std SL dish "attached" to the roof of their car. Starlink of course can't condone this for safety reasons, but it works.

[liamricci]

Ordered.
RV. Flat HP.

Heaven help us...[bigwhistle]

What is the waiting time now?

[Pedro_The_Swift]

delivery on 15th? so two weeks... to Perth from Vic.

[Tins]

delivery on 15th? so two weeks... to Perth from Vic.

Keep us informed. I want this on my OKA. I'm going to miss out on the sale price sadly, but I still want.

[Pedro_The_Swift]

just emailed Telcoantennas about conversion to 12v,
they already sell a
12VDC to 48VDC PoE - Gigabit Passive Power over Ethernet Injector
so now its down to rewired cables..

you'd think with all the famous IT people we have on here someone would make a couple up and flog them off on ebay----

[Tins]

From the OKA page:

182421

[goingbush]

Mate of mine has converted the SL power brick to 12V

Ive bought the parts to do the conversion but happily running from inverter for now.

Modifying the Starlink Power Supply to run on AC and DC - Tucks' Truck (https://www.tuckstruck.net/truck-and-kit/geekery/modifying-the-starlink-power-supply-to-run-on-ac-and-dc/)

[Pedro_The_Swift]

Vid from 'Merica shows an average of 2.75AH over 7 hours on 12V with what I thought was normal usage. Startup was 6-7A but only for a minute or two,, There is a switch for snow melting and that uses 10 -13A.
How do you get that sort of current over an ethernet cable??

[Tins]

How do you get that sort of current over an ethernet cable??

Briefly, I would have thought.

[W&KO]

Been using starlink while we’ve stopped for work….

Very poor reception where we are working…even with a direction antenna though a modem we couldn’t stream anything, best we could do was to download movies or tv shows before 7am in the morning to watch that night.

Using starlink we can both be streaming without issues….it even works during rain, did have a Shiite outage during a massive storm.

Only problem is we don’t have room in our car to store while traveling, may look at disabling the motors and mount the dish on the rook rack, that’s one piece we don’t have to store in the defer

Currently have 5 starlinks in and around the staff accommodation along with the odd caravan with one deployed on the ground next to themselves

[Pedro_The_Swift]

MOBILE Starlink now available in AUS!!!

Monthly cost is a bit !!!!!!!!!!!!!

[W&KO]

MOBILE Starlink now available in AUS!!!

Monthly cost is a bit !!!!!!!!!!!!!

It’ll be interesting to see if starlink crack down on those that have modified there existing units.

[Tins]

It’ll be interesting to see if starlink crack down on those that have modified there existing units.

AFAIK, they haven't done so in the US. You pay for the service regardless..

[W&KO]

AFAIK, they haven't done so in the US. You pay for the service regardless..

They are nailing guys using in boats, I reckon they’ll stop guys using there RV dish while driving

[Tins]

I reckon they’ll stop guys using there RV dish while driving

I believe that will be for safety reasons. US liability laws are "interesting".

Just my opinion, but I can't see them preventing access from older equipment as long as it's stationary, if the extra "roaming" fee is paid. Of course, anything is possible, given how new SL is, all going to come down to profits.

[W&KO]

I believe that will be for safety reasons. US liability laws are "interesting".

Just my opinion, but I can't see them preventing access from older equipment as long as it's stationary, if the extra "roaming" fee is paid. Of course, anything is possible, given how new SL is, all going to come down to profits.

It’s not for safety reasons as in-motion has just been released……but the hardware is like 10x mores and the monthly access is 2-3 times more.

Starling have been pausing accounts that are using the RV/Roam unit on boats. I reckon they crack down on the car using it given in-motion is available in AUS

Time will tell…we hit the road again in September , will see if anything changes between now and than

[Tins]

It’s not for safety reasons as in-motion has just been released……but the hardware is like 10x mores and the monthly access is 2-3 times more.

Starling have been pausing accounts that are using the RV/Roam unit on boats. I reckon they crack down on the car using it given in-motion is available in AUS

Time will tell…we hit the road again in September , will see if anything changes between now and than

Cheers. Have to admit my info is a bit out of date as the budget has not been there for me to get it yet.

[prelude]

Just don't use it whilst driving :)

What I am more interested in is the "though shalt not use it outside of your own area" meaning, using the starlink device outside the country or "region" whatever that may be it was bought. I know an internet bloke who bought it in south america and is paying significantly less per month. It seems the price of the unit and subscription is adapted to the median income per country or smth. By that same token, I know of overlanders from germany who brought their unit over to south america and it is still working as of a month ago. However, starlink introduced the subscription option "mobile global" which costs more than twice as much so I wonder if they will be cracking down on that... I was hoping to use our starlink on the road but if they do enforce that, it'll not just become pricey but generally unaffordable to us :(

Cheers,
-P

[RobMichelle]

Scientists prove Elon Musk's Starlink satellites are interfering with ability to study the cosmos
Deep space experts prove Elon Musk'''s Starlink is interfering in scientific work - ABC News (https://www.abc.net.au/news/2023-07-09/elon-musk-starlink-interfering-in-scientific-work/102575480)

[Tins]

If you have a rural address SL is currently $200!

186182

[W&KO]

Scientists prove Elon Musk's Starlink satellites are interfering with ability to study the cosmos
Deep space experts prove Elon Musk'''s Starlink is interfering in scientific work - ABC News (https://www.abc.net.au/news/2023-07-09/elon-musk-starlink-interfering-in-scientific-work/102575480)

I’m getting more value out of starlink over the last 5 months than I Eve have out of the cosmos

[Pedro_The_Swift]

If you have a rural address SL is currently $200!

186182

Yea,, but not the HP Flat panel mount on your roof permanently type...
The one I want is around 200 a month,, plus hardware!

[Tins]

Seems like Starlink are offering refurbished equipment for $299 until Jan 5. I have no more info.

[prelude]

It's been a while since I last used my starlink (about two years I reckon) so I thought I'd unpack it and set it up to see what's what before we go to the abenteuer und alrad messe in a couple of days.

I expected some trouble since the device was off for so long. I did power it up a year ago and let it sit so it could fetch updates (without activating the subscription) but never checked if it worked. So I got it out today and plonked the dish outside (wooded area) and plugged it in. I could connect to the wifi router named "starlink" which surprised me. Turns out that the router had lost all settings and had gone back to default. No biggy, I simply made a new wifi SSID and gave it a password and done.

I then reactivated the plan (via my PC since you can't do that trough starlink if you do not have it activated it seems which I would like to see them fix) and waited for a couple of hours. I downloaded a dish update, a bunch of updates for the router and what not, it rebooted half a dozen times and started on it's merry way to find where the hell all the satellites had gone :) Eventually it found it's way and it is up and running again. Not bad! but I am glad I did all this before I reached my camp site.

On the camp-site I suspect there will be (by now) many MANY starlink users so I am looking forward to doing this experiment to see what happens when all of a sudden in an area where probably no one owns/operates a starlink unit dozens of units will want to make use of it.

What I did notice though is that the mobile - global roaming plan has increased price to 450 euros a month! (that's almost 750AUD) so I am seriously doubting that I will be taking that thing with me on our trip because there is no way we are going to be able to pay that. A shame really. I guess the only option is to buy a new starlink per region and have mobile region plans and sell it when we leave that particular region.

Cheers,
-P

[W&KO]

Pretty sure The global roaming plan is for user wanting to use while driving.

If your jut setting up while stationary at camp than price hasn’t changed.

[oka374]

For those that want to run their 2nd version Starlink on 12v Yaosheng have released a 3 in 1 unit that connects to 12v, connects to the router of your choice and connects to the dishy without cutting any cables, it also comes with the shielded RJ45 cable wired correctly for Starlink to connect the router.
YAOSHENG 120W 3-IN-1 Step Up PoE Injector for Residential Starlink V2 (Starlink 12V, 24V conversion)

[prelude]

I'll have to try and confirm that with some overlanders, if I can get in touch with any of them without all the social stuff (what happened to email? :P) because I do wonder about it.

That 12v unit is indeed handy, not sure about keeping the cable at the length it is though. Personally I would not mind cutting it but then again having the option to put the dish further away from the vehicle can be beneficial.

I'll try to get in touch with some people on the webs to see if roaming still works on the cheaper plan.

Cheers,
-P

[goingbush]

Pretty sure The global roaming plan is for user wanting to use while driving.

If your jut setting up while stationary at camp than price hasn’t changed.

Global roaming is if your touring the world & want to go from country to country.

I have the Mobile - regional plan , I pause it at home. $174.00 a month when I activate it. It works while driving no problems,

[prelude]

Turns out that two overlanders got back to me with the same answer so I'll take it as gospel:


Nobody's using global roam.

You just need to move your account to country you're going to, and use regional roam there.

ie. what you do is: you cancel the service and transfer the ownership of the starlink gear. You will need a second mail address to be able to do so. You can use the same credit card and phone number in the second account. You then place an order in the new account for the other country/region you go to and select the "I already have my starlink" and enter the KIT number. You will also need to be at the registered address for this to work (ie. you are at a camp ground, hotel, wherever in the region you are "buying" your new account) so that the dish will activate, it checks it's position so it won't activate if you are not there. Since you can click on a map to register your location so this can be virtually anywhere. Activation should take all of a couple of minutes and when that is done you are good to go and travel on!

One thing to keep in mind is that they have also introduced a rule that you can’t transfer ownership for 120 days from purchase or 90 days from first registration but I can’t see that being an issue given the speed most overlanders travel.

I guess not many will travel outside of Australia with their device but this is how it is done and what we will be doing. I am glad there is an option because it will save a heck of a lot of money!

Also, Global Roaming makes use of the "space lasers" between the satellites so it actually offers coverage anywhere in the world, even the parts that do not have official coverage yet. This is probably why this option is so expensive since you make use of a limited infrastructure; the bandwidth between the sats. Area's that have coverage connect to the nearest ground station as to limit the bandwidth used on the interconnects between the satellites.

Anyway, hope this is useful to someone.

Cheers,
-P

[oka374]

Prelude you probably already know this but if you aren't into cutting cables and reterminating them there are quite a few places offering different length cables now including Starlink.

[prelude]

Yes, I am aware that shorter cables exist. It's a package deal I would say. With that I mean: if I want to keep things light on my vehicle I would ditch the stand, cut up the dish, integrate in in/onto the roof, ditch the seriously heavy router and make a custom cable that would be just about right to fit into the fixed setup. I reckon I could save over half the weight of the entire thing.

The only real advantage to having the usual setup (perhaps custom router) is that you can place the dish somewhere in a clear area as opposed to having to park you car in the sun. I was "lucky?" enough to have parked in a clear area on my trip to Germany since the fields were so water logged my FWD T4 transporter camper van would not even maybe get on there. I'll be lucky to get out of level ground that has been seriously chopped up by vehicles as large as 8x8 trucks.

Anyway, I digress. Having placed the dish on the bonnet of my mates jeep with virtually no obstructions around it performs well, as is to be expected. I have not been able (with my broken foot and all) to explore all of the camp area's around but from the main paths where my wheelchair could be pushed I found about a dozen starlink dishes. Were I to extrapolate the total number of them in the area I think at most 50 of them are around and probably not all of them active. I still get decent performance: Speedtest by Ookla - The Global Broadband Speed Test (https://www.speedtest.net/result/16318642506)

All in all I am quite happy with how it works, just not so much with the power consumption. It seems to "idle" at around 50-60watts". This includes the losses of the 200VA inverter (true sine so with a toroid transformer) and the power supply in the router etc. Admittedly, I borrowed this old bus and it has only 200Ah of very worn AGM batteries that will hold 130 at most and a 30 year old 100 watt solar panel that will put out 80 in full sun at most so that is not ideal but I do have to turn the thing of when not using it.

To conclude; I will have to see whether I will mount it fixed into the car or leave it as a stand alone unit but it seems like we would be bringing it along since there definitely is a use for it. I have not used much data over starlink whilst we were here but then again there is a campfire and a messe to visit etc. so why bother being on the internet :)

Looking forward to your experiences!

Cheers,
-P

[Tins]

Not sure if they apply here yet, but they will. Obviously he is talking $US,


https://youtu.be/CVQ90kHFUEw'si=vFImThkli-UkDAQz

[W&KO]

Not sure if they apply here yet, but they will. Obviously he is talking $US,


https://youtu.be/CVQ90kHFUEw'si=vFImThkli-UkDAQz

I received an email yesterday with new pricing…in now includes in motion

[Tins]

I received an email yesterday with new pricing…in now includes in motion

Just gets more appealing.

[goingbush]

I received an email yesterday with new pricing…in now includes in motion

In motion has always been a feature (unoficially) Now they have decided to officially include it & charge for it.

Our original round dish is embedded into the roof of our truck (yes I cut a hole in the roof & its flush mounted) for over 2 years now & its always worked perfectly in motion.

Its now also cheaper to opt for the 50Gb plan ($80 a month) and pay an extra $3.00 ish per gb if you go over . Typically we use less than 100gb.

[prelude]

Just gets more appealing... Not sure mate :) Depends on your use case. For me I was initially happy to read about international travel aspect but 2 months only so still useless for us permanent overlanders. Back to the "move per country" scheme it is. In motion does sound appealing, although it unofficially worked except for a short time a few years back. I am still very much in doubt whether I should mount my dish permanently like goingbush has. I have the gen2 dish and fixing it permanently does mean permanently hacking it up [bighmmm] if I were to not mount it permanently the in motion stuff is quite irrelevant as well.

Personally, I do not think a 50GB plan is even close to enough but I never really measured my traffic per day/week/month. I do know that with streaming stuff and such traffic does add up quite a bit. Your average movie for example on amazon, netflix or whatever will certainly be 5GB at HD quality. That's "just" 10 movies per month and then the rest of the internet usage needs to be added to that.

If you only use it for simple stuff it would suffice, and who wants to watch netflix when you have the bush telly on :) But we would be also using it for work so that requires a connection without hiccups and preferably enough data. We will see as time goes on.

Cheers,
-P

[DieselLSE]

Can you make mobile calls using Starlink? If it uses WiFi I sort of think it should, but nothing I read on the Starlink site mentioned phone comms.

[oka374]

Yes Starlink does support wifi/data calling if your phone is capable. Our phones do it automatically but some require you to physically turn it on in the phone.

[W&KO]

Can you make mobile calls using Starlink? If it uses WiFi I sort of think it should, but nothing I read on the Starlink site mentioned phone comms.

Sure can….it was our solution for 6 months while doing some seasonal work

[Slunnie]

Yes, we also use it for phone calls. It's a thousand times better than a sat phone and your text messages come through also.

[John_D4]

Can you have all the hardware installed and just activate it for when you’re away and put the plan on hold while the camper is sitting around at home?

[W&KO]

Can you have all the hardware installed and just activate it for when you’re away and put the plan on hold while the camper is sitting around at home?

Sure can….

[prelude]

The plan is called roam(ing). You can pause it whenever you like and reactive when you need it. Just throw the starlink gear into the car/camper and you're done. Permanently wiring it up/mounting it does require some attention but it is definitely a good solution. I had mine "paused" for almost two years and it reactivated no problem. It did take quite a while to get up and running though since it installed a bunch of OTA updates for both the dish and the router and rebooted several times. I would recommend that you resume the plan whilst at home and let it do it's thing for a couple of hours in the driveway so that it is updated, tested and ready to go.

Cheers,
-P

[oka374]

Wwhat I was advised to do and have done is even when the account/dish is paused hook it up at home every month or so and let it do updates as required, you don't have to activate it to get updates.
With the "new" options on a roam account of 50GB for $80 on all dishy's, international roaming and up to 12km to sea they're going to be popular.
Then there are the current discounts for the 3rd gen at Bunnings, JB and Officeworks as well.
With the 50gb for $80 it has to be an option for some for home use as well, cheaper than most of the NBN providers with no speed constraints.

[prelude]

I reckon the 12 (I hope miles not km) on see, aka the sovereign waters around each country would make them heaps more popular indeed. International roaming, I am not sure about. Generally speaking you could already roam with europe for example so it would only add value if you roam outside of europe. Sure, people do but then 2 months is not a lot of time to do so. I guess for people living on the edge of a region, it would be beneficial, for most other purposes it is not.

Funny how in OZ you guys still have shall we say bad luck. Now with starlink the coverage has increased dramatically over the country and STILL it is heaps expensive (from my POV). I don't even get the option for 50GB over here, I just get the "standard" terrabyte since uplink stations and available bandwidth to/from them is a no brainer in this densely population postage stamp. A lot of people over here can get 8gbit internet over fibre at their home for 80 bucks.

Feeding starlink's satelites in OZ is still somewhat of a challenge it seems so prices go up (naturally). Maybe, perhaps, one day... Also makes me wonder how the capacity of the intercontinental uplink into australia and new zealand is doing :)

In any case, back to starlink and especially calling itself. We can conclude that calling works a lot better over starlink, as long as you have a cell phone (and provider) that support wifi calling, compared to cell service or even sat phones. However, would one argue that there is no longer a need for a sat phone in case of emergency? Those things are cumbersome, expensive and generally indeed a bit of a faff to use so if they could be skipped it would be a benefit I reckon.

Cheers,
-P

[V8Ian]

Sat phones are not reliable, take it from one who has stood on the top of a road train, with one foot in the air, holding a wire coat hanger, searching unsuccessfully for a signal, in remote Western Australia.

[prelude]

Now I would pay to see that :D
-P

[Tins]

Funny how in OZ you guys still have shall we say bad luck. Now with starlink the coverage has increased dramatically over the country and STILL it is heaps expensive (from my POV). I don't even get the option for 50GB over here, I just get the "standard" terrabyte since uplink stations and available bandwidth to/from them is a no brainer in this densely population postage stamp. A lot of people over here can get 8gbit internet over fibre at their home for 80 bucks.

Feeding starlink's satelites in OZ is still somewhat of a challenge it seems so prices go up (naturally). Maybe, perhaps, one day... Also makes me wonder how the capacity of the intercontinental uplink into australia and new zealand is doing :)


Cheers,
-P

Bad luck?? Many people knew ( I was one of them ) that our govt intervention into the fibre sector was doomed from the beginning. The NBN began as an ill conceived white elephant and grew into a herd of albino wooly mammoths. But they've got to pay for the bloody thing somehow. Competition is not welcome.

From what I have read so far, there's not a whole lot of difference between the northern and southern hemisphere as far as Starlink is concerned. There are differences in orientation, and earth curvature, but not much else, so it seems that SL pricing here may be "influenced".

[goingbush]

Lashed out and bought myself a Starlink Mini from Harvey Norman. the thing is tiny, about the same size a sheet of A4 paper. (thicker though)

Already have a Starlink round dish on my truck, but it wont leave much of the 100ah aux battery if I leave it on all night.

I got the SL mini which I have stuck under one of the roof hatch skylight thingies in the caravan. Plugged into the inverter all night it hardly affects the draw on the 200ah van batteries . Speeds on par or better than the round dish.

Ive ordered a USB-C power lead for it so will plug it into a 12v- USB-C 100w adapter , no more 240v needed.

only it makes an annoying buzzing sound , which most people can't hear but its harmonises (in a bad way) with by tinnitus , apparently the USB-C lead helps with that as its a smoother power supply.

Ive got the SL mini on the 50gb plan ($80) and switched the truck dish to 50gb plan too. so cheaper overall now than the $174 plan I was on just for the round dish.

[Tins]

You seen these?? (https://starvmount.com/eu/starvmount-dc-power-supply.html)

[goingbush]

You seen these?? (https://starvmount.com/eu/starvmount-dc-power-supply.html)

No, it looks good though, but wont work with my Gen1 V2 round dish, , I have a kit of parts to convert my round dish to run on 12v but never got around to it.

[oka374]

JT I've got a similar 3 in 1 Yaosheng unit for my gen2 Starlink to run on 12v, I leave it on 24/7 when we're stopped and occasionally when mobile.

[Tins]

It's interesting. Not sure what the advantages are yet, Apart from the more stable power supply you get, and the multivoltage support ( not 48v though, which some RV setups seem to use )and the freedom to choose your own router. That last one could be a pro, given that I have seen a few reports of SL routers failing and they're not cheap.... well, as cheap. I like that you son't need the inverter to run SL. I imagine though that SL will be like  and eventually cut out the middle man and supply something themselves.

Dunno why I'm looking. There's a whole gamut of stuff for me to do on my OKA before I need to worry about internet access....

[austastar]

It's interesting.
.
.
Dunno why I'm looking. There's a whole gamut of stuff for me to do on my OKA before I need to worry about internet access....

Hi,
It's called productive procrastination.
It is good for the brain.

Cheers

[oka374]

I was talking to a gen 3 dishy owner in a camp spot the other day and he was using a Victron Orion-TR 12/48-8A (380w) to run Starlink. The Victron is adjustable up to just under 60v and the Starlink can run on about 55v and up to it's required 57v. The Victron typically costs more than the Gen3 dishy but it makes for an elegant soluion to running it on 12v.
The Gen 2 like mine runs on 48v so the Victron could be used to run a gen 2 too but the Yaosheng 3 in 1 from Aliexpress is cheaper and does the same job plus has the correct connections for the Gen 2 dishy cable.

[prelude]

so, the mini is on sale for a couple of weeks down here which got me to do some research and... I actually think it is a life saver for us!

My original concerns still stand but time has proven that starlink is not necessarily out to get us (international) overlanders so the workarounds to keep the service going seem to be still valid with no signs of going away. On to the positive stuff :)

The mini is significantly smaller and lighter. If I calculated correctly my gen2 setup is about 14kg and the mini (just the dish) is a tad over 1kg. That is a huge difference! The unit also has a simple barrel plug for power (5.5mm 2.1 for the pin) and can be powered from 12 to 48 volts. This means no USB-C, no wall plug no nothing just hook it up to your batteries! No more buck/boost/inverter losses! Sure, you need to make sure you have a decent wire gauge and this might only work on lithium since they don't really drop below 12v ever but that'll do for me.

The mini also still has an ethernet port so you can use it with your own router if you so desire (I do) yet it is still so portable that you can just use it's builtin wifi and toss it outside when parked underneath trees.

The only (valid) argument I have found that might cause people to consider the gen3 in stead is: speed. The larger dish will perform better in adverse conditions simply due to a larger antenna array and it also seems the larger array is capable of pushing through more data at the cost of higher power consumption. So for those of us who do youtube or whatever and need to send/receive large files around, you can push a lot more data at only a small increase of power usage which means that you would actually use less power to send/receive the same amount of data but I think that is a corner case for most people. (refence: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=80eheLG8Stk )

Also, the mini does NOT work with POE (power over ethernet) so you would need 2 long cables if you want to use the unit outside with the ethernet port, although I think that POE also exists as separate units, ie works like a bias-t the same way it does for say antenna's etc. This way you can insert POE at one end and strip it off at the other. I do think 12v operation might suffer due to the small wire gauge and losses but that is something I still have to look into.

I am about to pull the trigger on this beauty but I was wondering if there are more comparison experiences here between any gen dishy and the mini? Not so much interested in speed as I am in performance during cloud, rain, trees, etc coverage.

Cheers!
-P

[oka374]

I occasionally look at the Australian Starlink users group on farcebook and they seem to get reasonable speeds on the mini, plenty of them mount it inside on the dash or in a sunroof or caravan hatch and it still seems to work ok.
A gen 3 should get higher speeds due to being bigger especially in marginal conditions.
On that note I've not noticed any differences between my Gen2 and my sisters Gen 3 when we've been camped up side by side. She has to fiddle around with hers sometimes aligning it in the correct direction in the app but other than that the gen3 is more compact to pack as there isn't a post sticking out the back of it.
The mini being much smaller would lend itself to permanent mounting externally better but the ability to put it on a Ram mount or similar and have it looking out the windscreen would be good, wouldn't work well on things like Defenders and Oka's with flat nearly vertical screens though.
Less bits to go wrong as it runs on 12v direct is a big thing, just don't use a fag socket and expect a reliable connection.

[Tombie]

Starlink has just releasede at DcDc power supply for Gen 3.... I have one coming...

[Tins]

This is interesting. Hope something similar comes here. Early days.


https://youtu.be/Z4MeVbIkRR4'si=IE1cSqzFYnpZ8EvH

[prelude]

In the end I got the mini and not a moment too soon since we are currently bunking in a so called "tiny house" for the time being. Since there is not internet service here other than my dataplan on my cellphone and it is not particularly fast I decided to give the mini a testrun before we ship it with the car.

I must say, I am both surprised and disappointed at the same time in the little bugger but overal I think it will serve us well the coming years during our travels.

First of all the placement. We are situated in the woods and it is winter over here fortunately so no leaves apart from some evergreen bushes but they are below the 110 degree angle of the dish anyway. There is only one spot where I can place the dish where it has decent clear skies which in in front of the house, looking over the roof. Still, as you can see in the attached image there is still a lot of obstructions but this is as good as I can get it:

192353

With this setup, under clear skies I get around 1 outage per 15 minutes on average, depending on the satellites I am connected to. Sometimes I can go 30 minutes without too much of a drop and then I get two very close to each other. For most internet use this is perfectly serviceable. Even VOIP calls (did not try video) it is workable since a drop of less than one second is usually nothing more than a glitch and only the 2 second + dropouts are very noticeable. With the other end aware of the problem you "only" need to repeat a bit of the conversation. Streaming video works just fine even on high quality settings and browsing works pretty much as you would expect. I have a VPN client on my systems which tells me when it is reconnecting so I have a sort of heartbeat monitor that tells me when the internet is down and that certainly helps with clicking a link more than once because something is not happening.

I also tried gaming and even though the latency is perfectly acceptable, the shorter dropouts are usually dealt with by the client but the longer dropouts cause serious problems even dropping you from the game. Not the main purpose of the starlink dish but it is nice to know that it can work.

However (there is always a "but" isn't there?) In anything but perfect conditions things get progressively worse. Cloud coverage is dealt with fairly well and hardly increases the dropouts and also does not impact speed noticeably but anything more than that has a severe impact on performance. We have a wood stove in the house and when firing it up, the early cold stove produces a stack of smoke of course and when the wind is blowing in the wrong direction over the dish I can see a drop in speed. Not so much an increase in dropouts. When there is fog the speeds generally decrease even more and dropouts do tend to rise. With heavy rain the dropouts increase substantially and the duration is also much longer in general.

The last few days it has even been snowing, which is nice :) but that really started to impact the mini. It turned it snow melt ability on, as it should, but the large flakes floating through the air seriously hindered the reception/transmission. My ping uptime went down to something like 75% dropouts were very regular and watching a 1080p30 youtube video was barely possible since I ran out of buffer on a few occasions. The speed seems to be ok since when there is reception for a longer spell it will recover the playback buffer.

Talking about speeds: The one thing that is a dissapointment on the unit is it's builtin wifi router. It is a great solution and one of the reasons I got the little dishy in the first place, smaller, lighter and much more ergonomic for our overland travels but it turns out that the wifi signal itself is pretty low. The dish is at most 4m away from my window (in a wooden building so not much steel or concrete if any) and about 1m below (since the house sits higher) and both my laptop as well as my desktop show me a 1 bar reduced signal strength. In general when performing a speed test on my iphone with the app I could see the speeds from starlink to the internet to be above 100mbit whilst both my laptop and desktop would struggle to reach 20mbit, mostly running at around 10mbit. The speed from starlink to my iphone was usually a lot better but then again, it is a phone which I hold in my hand standing in front of the window so it has a much better LOS I suppose.

In order to determine if the dish itself performs better than I could experience through wifi I have plugged in a 20m long ethernet cable directly into my desktop. Where at first I could just about watch 1080p60 content I can now easily watch 1440p content without issue and my speeds are up to 150mbit on a good day.

So, to sum this all up, what does this mean? Well, I think that the mini will work quite nicely in open areas for just about any purpose. It will also work in motion as I understand it (but have not tested that) We intend to mount the dish on top of the roof, inside the spare tyre which would give a perfectly nice view of the sky. Since the wifi router at that point is about 1m tops away from our devices and only has to go through 30mm of sandwich paneling it should give me full performance at any time. But this is where it gets interesting; like with solar panels on top of the roof vs a solar blanket you want to park the car in the shade but have all the sun :) The same goes for starlink; placing it on the roof and parking underneath trees it simply won't work I reckon. Bringing a longer powercable or even a battery mod so you can use your powertool batttery for a couple of hours to place it say 30m away from the vehicle will get you nice starlink to internet performance but I suspect pretty bad wifi performance, judging by my experiences thus far.

I have also been looking into the power situation. I was at first considering powering the device directly from 12 volts but it seems there are reports floating around that the dish gets real hot when using low voltage. Not sure why that is. The second issue is voltage drop. We will be running lithium batteries, against my better judgement, so we should pretty much always have over 12v available but voltage drop over the cable does become a thing. On average the mini reports that is uses 18watts. that is pretty much bang on 1.5Amps at 12 volts. In order to reduce the voltage drop due to wire resistance I would need to run a decent diameter cable, which is perfectly doable when the dish sits on its perch on the roof but not when 30m away from the car. (and not battery powered)

The second observation is that the mini does not support PoE, which makes sense I guess since it was not designed the way the other dishes were. I would however be very useful in our case since we could then simply have a single cable running from the car to the dish and place it in an unobstructed location. I have looked into passive PoE and delock seems to sell a unit which has the exact correct barrel plug specifications for the mini. It works by disabling the gigabit wires and only use the 4 100mbit wires leaving the other 4 available for power but that is acceptable as far as I am concerned. The thing is though that the generally very small diameter of ethernet cable wires (mostly 0,5mm2 per wire) would cause too much power drop over the cable to connect it directly to 12volts and a stepup converter would be needed.

Not sure yet what I'll do.

Cheers,
-P

[Tins]

I note that SL is now offering 50GB of "backup" in the US. Not sure just what that means, but their track record suggests the feature will likely roll out elsewhere reasonably soon. 50 ain't all that much, I guess, but could be bloody useful when travelling if you have no other cloud services.
Hmm, haven't looked at how cloud stuff gets billed on SL.

[craigbushman]

They finally sucked me in with their $299 sale for the Starlink Mini hardware.

The unit arrived the other day and it seems to work well. I get better speeds than the telstra 5G wifi hotspot I've been using.

I put it all into an old Trimcast case I've had laying around here at home with a view to making a portable kit which we can throw into any of the cars for remote area interwebs while travelling.

The trimcast case can be secured to the cam net rack of either the Perentie FFR or RFSV or the roof rack of my Mrs JKU Jeep as a low-profile enclosure for the dish, since these will operate through the lid.

Inside the case will be a pair of Kings 12Ah lithium powerpacks wired in parallel for a total of 24Ah. This should last around 10hrs continuous use. While travelling the dish can run off the vehicles' house battery while also recharging the Kings powerpack/s.

For basecamp use, I have a pair of 200W solar blankets I carry in the storage bins in the RFSV as well as a separate 135Ah battery box.

Still waiting some different cables to arrive, including a waterproof ethernet adapter which allows the Starlink terminal to be used with a direct wired connection to the computer rather than over wifi - this should save some battery life and reduce the EM footprint of the unit.

So far I've only done backyard testing, but as I get more experience with the unit I'll relate my experiences here.


192565192566.

[prelude]

Having had to rely on starlink for the past 6 months on 3 different locations/situations now I thought I'd share my experiences (again).

Most if not all of the comments I made in my previous post are still valid and we have since moved to a different location into a wooden chalet. Tall trees line the property which have since grown full of leaves since it is summer down here. Since my previous experiences told me that obstructions are really the main problem with satellite communication I was a bit stubborn (or experimental, you choose) and aimed the mini, which does not self align, at the only spot where the dish would have the most available clear skies.

Well, that did not work out as planned. The chalet has a partial flat roof on top of the extension which made for the perfect spot to place the dish. I positioned it so that it would be as close to the edge of the roof as it could get without hurting its field of view. Turns out, of course, I still get a lot of obstructions but it was the best I could do. As the spring progressed into the summer more foliage started to appear and the performance of the dish really started hurting. No longer could one watch a decent youtube video without running out of buffer and anything that required real time internet was a struggle. The most I could get would be 15 minutes, if that, if internet at one go and more often than not I would have serious dropouts every few minutes. My ping success would be as low as 70% and things became unworkable.

Last week we went to the abenteuer und allrad messe and I broke out my gen 2 dish from storage. I decided to bring the mini and see if I could compare the mini with the 2 at some point. As that goes on short holidays with a planning, never enough time for the things you think you can pick up on the side [bighmmm] In any case, we were situated in a river valley that blocked quite a lot of view of the sky but we did run the mini for a couple of hours. I thought it a good test to see what starlink would be like when camping up for the night and just get some internet work done or watch a video. It took the poor thing 15 minutes to figure out it was 600k's further east than before but it did work in the end, albeit with massive interruptions as was to be expected. I did watch a youtube live stream and the biggest advantage here is that a live stream will simply stop to buffer on your local device. ie. at some point the buffer was large enough to never really have another interruption so that was great! I doubt though that watching another service would be possible.

Speaking of which, in both my previous setups I was unable to properly watch amazon prime (we got it for free, should not matter in service right?). Their app would not handle the prolonged dropouts resulting in tcp/ip timeouts gracefully and it would drop me to the main screen again. I had to restart playback, it would sortof remember where we were and get on with it. Now, amazon does provide the option to download content to watch later which is in the end what I did but dang. Having to click on clarksons farm S4E1 and then wait a long time for the rather slow and buggy internet to pull it in is a pain. Also, this process is also not graceful in failing you have to manually restart the download if it fails.

As usual, I digress, this is about starlink not amazon :D

Back to the dishies; when I got back home I decided to skip internet for a night and tether my phone if need be and placed the gen 2 (without a subscription activated) on the exact opposite corner of the roof and allowed for its auto alignment to do the trick. The dish will work and generate obstruction data etc. even without an active subscription. I let it run for some 24hours to see what it did. The dish pointed itself, by chance, in the only slightly less dense foliage area of the trees and started collecting data. After stabilizing the ping time was well over 99% which was a surprise, so, I pulled the gen2 off and on went the mini, manually aligning it as per the app which ended up in roughly the same direction of course. To my surprise the ping uptime after another 24 hours was also up into the 99%

My conclusion so far: unless you are actually looking into a wall, mountain or a dense forrest it is probably better to not stubbornly choose a clear sky for the mini (and probably the same goes for the gen3 or a modified gen 2). It seems that


tracking satellites that are not moving in the direction the software is optimized for will just not work as well
there are not enough satellites in the constellation to provide coverage side to side as opposed to top to bottom
a bit of both?


I have since put the gen2 back on the roof since the mini's wifi, as previously reported, is really poor and so is the wifi on my mac pro. The fairly short distance through a wooden house was already too much and I would not get any more than 10mbit or so whilst my phone went like a rocket.

Hope this helps someone :)

Cheers,
-P

[gavinwibrow]

Right, daughter and hubby are doing the big circle with 2 pre teen daughters who have ipads, especially for those longer journeys with not a lot to see.
If they install a satellite communication system, either in the van, (or probably more flexible in the car?), does it operate successfully while traveling as well as when camped?

[prelude]

Anecdotally (I have yet to test it properly myself) yes. If they have the dish preferably outside with a clear view of the sky it will work with normal road speeds. The thing is anything that is in the view will cause interruptions. So on large open sections of road without any overgrowth (nularbour) it will do just fine. Cruising through dense vegetation and it will work like the proverbial excrement.

To watch youtube video's it will probably work just well enough to suffer through. When not watching in 4k youtube buffers a healthy amount of data to handle the dropouts. For something like instagram, (god forbid) tiktok and other endless doomscrolling apps it will work a lot worse since those do no preload and buffer a lot at all so you need to have a nearly always on connection.

I currently have my gen 2 dishy pointed at the tree line and dropouts still occur although it has gotten much better. What you will find is you scroll down and nothing loads for seconds at a time :( Kids are not known to be patient BUT if they can handle it and adjust their internet behaviour, ie watch something on youtube, it'll be fine!

The download function on amazon is also a good thing. They can download something on the ipad to watch later when they have reception. Direct streaming will fail a lot of the time do to timeouts (see my previous post(s))

Cheers,
-P

[Tombie]

Right, daughter and hubby are doing the big circle with 2 pre teen daughters who have ipads, especially for those longer journeys with not a lot to see.
If they install a satellite communication system, either in the van, (or probably more flexible in the car?), does it operate successfully while traveling as well as when camped?

It certainly does!

I have Gen 4 Starlink at home and a Mini on the D4 for travel.

I mounted to the D4 as when we go driving away from camp, we desire the communications if needed.

Mines wired via a Step Up to get it to 30v as 12v can be flakey / unreliable.

I also have a key fob remote to power it on/off whilst inside the van so we don't need it burning (~2ah) when not needed and don't have to go out to turn it on.

This is the mount mine is in, complete with protective cover to prevent damage to the top.

https://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/20250813/afad837b976b9f1bbf5e73fb56ca9e30.jpg

Ignore the cable hanging off the back - that was during testing, it's now run through a decktite fitting for a clean install.

[John_D4]

It certainly does!

I have Gen 4 Starlink at home and a Mini on the D4 for travel.

I mounted to the D4 as when we go driving away from camp, we desire the communications if needed.

Mines wired via a Step Up to get it to 30v as 12v can be flakey / unreliable.

I also have a key fob remote to power it on/off whilst inside the van so we don't need it burning (~2ah) when not needed and don't have to go out to turn it on.

This is the mount mine is in, complete with protective cover to prevent damage to the top.

https://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/20250813/afad837b976b9f1bbf5e73fb56ca9e30.jpg

Ignore the cable hanging off the back - that was during testing, it's now run through a decktite fitting for a clean install.

Would you mind posting enclosure details Tombie? Also, what's the roof mounted electrical fitting - I haven't seen those before.

[oka374]

As the Starlink does get warm when in use is enclosing it as you have done albeit with some airflow underneath as I gather the base isn't sealed, cause any long term affects to either performance or lifespan due to getting too hot especially in midsummer when stationary in full sun?

[Tombie]

Would you mind posting enclosure details Tombie? Also, what's the roof mounted electrical fitting - I haven't seen those before.

This is the mount

Starlink Roof Mount for Starlink Mini | Durable & Secure | Aussie Made (https://www.svntyoffroad.com.au/products/starlink-mini-mount?variant=45297402839191&country=AU&currency=AUD&utm_medium=product_sync&utm_source=google&utm_content=sag_organic&utm_campaign=sag_organic&utm_source=google&utm_medium=ppc&utm_campaign=%7Bcampaignname%7D&utm_id=21998175729&utm_content=asset_group_6537172249&gad_source=1&gad_campaignid=22008398308&gbraid=0AAAAABRX8kcSorqD6kfQNp5fv4GAMC2FD&gclid=CjwKCAjw7_DEBhAeEiwAWKiCCwf9k5tbcKQmCJwK-MoPrL83OVMCxXYpC6aabxI33BnMz1YrTQ1x1hoCIBUQAvD_BwE )

And this is the cable gland

Customizable IP68 Multi-Cable Seal – Marine-Grade for Campervans & Caravans
– Campervan Builders (https://campervanbuilders.com.au/products/ds-low-profile-16a-black-black-aluminium?variant=50028367282482&country=AU&currency=AUD&utm_medium=product_sync&utm_source=google&utm_content=sag_organic&utm_campaign=sag_organic&gad_source=1&gad_campaignid=21287091078&gbraid=0AAAAA9pSJNEcRgTcWGHdc14JYL98j-41r&gclid=CjwKCAjw7_DEBhAeEiwAWKiCCx1UwaZJDj3mcYVhaDda Fw36QEkLfhFCWJLcHnfP_9cCfV1a9nW0PBoC7ToQAvD_BwE)

[Tombie]

As the Starlink does get warm when in use is enclosing it as you have done albeit with some airflow underneath as I gather the base isn't sealed, cause any long term affects to either performance or lifespan due to getting too hot especially in midsummer when stationary in full sun?

The Starlink is designed for in sun use, the supporting ?cage? has quite a lot of breathing area.

Even in direct sun, and in use, it's showing no signs of issue. The units can heat to remove snow etc and get far warmer doing that than sitting there in the sun.

The company making the mount do recommend using a white cover in high temp / sunlight environments.

[John_D4]

This is the mount

Starlink Roof Mount for Starlink Mini | Durable & Secure | Aussie Made (https://www.svntyoffroad.com.au/products/starlink-mini-mount?variant=45297402839191&country=AU&currency=AUD&utm_medium=product_sync&utm_source=google&utm_content=sag_organic&utm_campaign=sag_organic&utm_source=google&utm_medium=ppc&utm_campaign=%7Bcampaignname%7D&utm_id=21998175729&utm_content=asset_group_6537172249&gad_source=1&gad_campaignid=22008398308&gbraid=0AAAAABRX8kcSorqD6kfQNp5fv4GAMC2FD&gclid=CjwKCAjw7_DEBhAeEiwAWKiCCwf9k5tbcKQmCJwK-MoPrL83OVMCxXYpC6aabxI33BnMz1YrTQ1x1hoCIBUQAvD_BwE )

And this is the cable gland

Customizable IP68 Multi-Cable Seal ? Marine-Grade for Campervans & Caravans
? Campervan Builders (https://campervanbuilders.com.au/products/ds-low-profile-16a-black-black-aluminium?variant=50028367282482&country=AU&currency=AUD&utm_medium=product_sync&utm_source=google&utm_content=sag_organic&utm_campaign=sag_organic&gad_source=1&gad_campaignid=21287091078&gbraid=0AAAAA9pSJNEcRgTcWGHdc14JYL98j-41r&gclid=CjwKCAjw7_DEBhAeEiwAWKiCCx1UwaZJDj3mcYVhaDda Fw36QEkLfhFCWJLcHnfP_9cCfV1a9nW0PBoC7ToQAvD_BwE)

Thanks Tombie

Your gland is different to that link, is yours an older model?

[Tombie]

Thanks Tombie

Your gland is different to that link, is yours an older model?

I have 2 on the roof now.

The one in the original picture and the one linked is located behind it now (no new pics at the moment)

[prelude]

About the heat, I would still think the all black would heat up a lot more... But hey, if it works :)

I also wonder how the wifi performs with so much metal between it and the user. I had my mini up on the tin roof of my current residence and it performed awful. With about 5m between starlink mini and my mac pro (which has the wifi antenna on the top) I got horrible performance. Maybe its just my unit?

Lastly but perhaps I should've said firstly: starlink is changing het pause feature for the mini's only it seems:

To opt-in, click Confirm Standby Mode and follow the steps below before 13/09/2025. If no action is taken, your paused service line will be cancelled.

ie. when you purchase a starlink mini with the intention to use it during your vacation and pause it for the remainder of the year, tough luck. The only option left will be to pay 60 bucks per year to keep it going or cancel it completely and re-register which means that you need to reapply effectively and that could mean that you won't be connected in very busy area's etc. as I read it.

Cheers,
-P

[Tombie]

Why cancel it? A great safety net for $8.50 and still allows things like messaging and calls.
I take advantage of it for my dash cams, monitoring is now live 24/7

There is minimal interference and as I type this it's on at the front of my driveway and I'm connected to it in my workshop 30 meters away in the back yard.

Tested out the back of Yunta, and parked 10 meters from my van, had faultless streaming of Netflix on the vans TV [emoji41]

It certainly doesn't seem to suffer from heat, inside the housing it's only supported on the edges and has a large air gap all around it.

Like I mentioned, it's been faultless in my application.

Wife loves that when on long haul drives, she has iPad streaming and headphones on whilst I have all my streaming audio, even well outside the 5g/4g network.

[Captain_Rightfoot]

I missed this thread. I bought a MINI when they were just released last year. Did a 2 week trip through the simpson. Mounted it on the roof with a 3d printed mount and powered by USB-C and it worked great. Like total game changer. Taking calls in the middle of the desert while driving is next level. Only issue was 2a of power draw PH, and a monster fight with carplay in the car because you can only have your phone connected to one WIFI network at a time. The first one it is what it is. The second problem I'm aware of a work around but It's not really my problem as I don't have a carplay unit in my car.

Since then I've had it paused until now when I need to apparently pay $8.5 a month. Oh well. It's still better than satphones.

And now with Apple offering emergency satellite support, and Telstra offering Starlink texting I feel as though I've got suitable redundancy.

[Tombie]

Pic showing the extra cable pass thru
https://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/20250816/e33ec331c3cb6d6bd92141b795f86e0b.jpg

Power isn't an issue with fob controlled relay.
That enables us to turn it on/off as required.

Plenty of solar on the vehicle to keep it all under control anyway [emoji851]

https://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/20250816/c61f7469078ed4262a487d4eb1d8b23b.jpg

[Tins]

Some interesting deals on for the next couple of weeks.

[Tins]

Hmm. Looks good. By the time I'm ready for Starlink Musk will have a phone for that. Meanwhile:


https://youtu.be/vzUYALnx_qc?si=g7SFPqjjPClDox3y

[Tombie]

I already have Data vis Starlink on my phone.
Works quite well.

[Captain_Rightfoot]

Took a trip to Burrinbar in NSW this weekend. We threw the starlink mini in because why not (it's tiny). Didn't think I'd need it...

When we got there there was almost no service .. sometimes you could get a text out.

Anyway worked out my plan resets on the 1st of each month. It's on standby at the moment. But if you switch plan you pay prorata for the rest of the month. So I switched to roam. Took a few minutes and the cost was $15 for the rest of the month. I have a power box in the car so I just plugged it in and popped it on the roof. Can keep up to date with whether dogs and children are alive at home. I ran it from Saturday afternoon until this morning and my battery was just over 50%.

When I got home switched back to standby so as of the first next month we will be back to standby.

I'd have to say that as much as it's a game changer for remote travel it's also super handy as general camping kit.

[Tins]

Have to say that I’m not in love with my ISP. Starlink can’t be worse.

[Tombie]

Took a trip to Burrinbar in NSW this weekend. We threw the starlink mini in because why not (it's tiny). Didn't think I'd need it...

When we got there there was almost no service .. sometimes you could get a text out.

Anyway worked out my plan resets on the 1st of each month. It's on standby at the moment. But if you switch plan you pay prorata for the rest of the month. So I switched to roam. Took a few minutes and the cost was $15 for the rest of the month. I have a power box in the car so I just plugged it in and popped it on the roof. Can keep up to date with whether dogs and children are alive at home. I ran it from Saturday afternoon until this morning and my battery was just over 50%.

When I got home switched back to standby so as of the first next month we will be back to standby.

I'd have to say that as much as it's a game changer for remote travel it's also super handy as general camping kit.

I take it you wanted full internet access?
In Standby it will allow texting and basic emails.

Bloody marvellous tech really.

[RANDLOVER]

Have to say that I’m not in love with my ISP. Starlink can’t be worse.


Also may not be more expensive as Starlink seem to have just released a $69/month plan to compete with home NBN.

[Captain_Rightfoot]

I take it you wanted full internet access?
In Standby it will allow texting and basic emails.

Bloody marvellous tech really.
Yes Noted. It does "work on standby" but for $15 thought we can have seamless access. :o

[RANDLOVER]

Took a trip to Burrinbar in NSW this weekend. We threw the starlink mini in because why not (it's tiny). Didn't think I'd need it...

When we got there there was almost no service .. sometimes you could get a text out.

Anyway worked out my plan resets on the 1st of each month. It's on standby at the moment. But if you switch plan you pay prorata for the rest of the month. So I switched to roam. Took a few minutes and the cost was $15 for the rest of the month. I have a power box in the car so I just plugged it in and popped it on the roof. Can keep up to date with whether dogs and children are alive at home. I ran it from Saturday afternoon until this morning and my battery was just over 50%.

When I got home switched back to standby so as of the first next month we will be back to standby.

I'd have to say that as much as it's a game changer for remote travel it's also super handy as general camping kit.

Great technology to view dogs sleeping, the only tourist destination I can think of with a reason for such poor mobile service is a nudist colony, as the visitors don't have anywhere to put their phones.

I did a similar trip on Australia Day I decided to see the most of Australia you can see on wheels anyway, crossed the border via dirt road into NSW and had Lamingtons for afternoon tea at Koreelah National Park.

The Starlink is probably more useful comms equipment than a CB as I came across a few vehicles along the dirt and no one seemed to know the etiquette of saying how many vehicles in their convoy.

[Tombie]

Yep. That seems to be all but dead.


I’m about to start fitting my 3rd Starlink unit - this one to the Touring truck.

Same mounting system, 30v step up power supply and remote controlled power relay.
With 500w of Solar and 200ah of aux batteries, this one will just be left on.

[Captain_Rightfoot]

Great technology to view dogs sleeping, the only tourist destination I can think of with a reason for such poor mobile service is a nudist colony, as the visitors don't have anywhere to put their phones.

I did a similar trip on Australia Day I decided to see the most of Australia you can see on wheels anyway, crossed the border via dirt road into NSW and had Lamingtons for afternoon tea at Koreelah National Park.

The Starlink is probably more useful comms equipment than a CB as I came across a few vehicles along the dirt and no one seemed to know the etiquette of saying how many vehicles in their convoy.

When I go into the desert it's a game changer. For the race I participate in .. in 2024 I was the only starlink (the mini was released in September and I was using one late Sept). Being able to streal live video from the race.. and talk to basecamp.. Wow. 2025 there were about 5. For the first time ever we could get live race updates from the rear of the convoy on the fly. As the lead car i could warn them about groups of vehicles coming back. We had a motorbike rider who was in quite a state after the boghole that was Poeppel Corner got the best of him. I gave him some electolyte and called the race doctor to get them to have a look at him and pressed on. Game changer. He gave $50 to rhe RFDS so everyone was stoked. I think someone even gave him a beer. :D

Being able to take calls while you're driving through dunes so good.

I do get the feeling that some people won't buy a tesla because of Musk. (please I don't want to discuss EV's here!). But Starlink is so good that I've never even heard that mentioned in the starlink context.

[Captain_Rightfoot]

Woot.. big news. Starlink is apparently using around 25% less power affter a software update. I think I noticed this on the weekend. 2a rather than 2.5.


https://youtu.be/2LDFUPfSmik?si=MjtHU4RUrMLXCCv_

[RANDLOVER]

I already have Data vis Starlink on my phone.
Works quite well.


I'm guessing iPhone and Telstra?

[Captain_Rightfoot]

I'm guessing iPhone and Telstra?
I have an iphone and Telstra.. I thought it was text only.

[RANDLOVER]

Yes I think it's text only, and it seems only Telstra has got it to work in Aus and only on iPhone.

[Tombie]

I'm guessing iPhone and Telstra?

Yep. Messaging is all I require for emergency

[Captain_Rightfoot]

Yes I think it's text only, and it seems only Telstra has got it to work in Aus and only on iPhone.
The problem with this service, and Apples emergency service is low signal performance.

I did a pushbike ride last year in WA, and spent a significant amount of time with one bar of Telstra. With that amount of signal you can't really do anything with the phone, but it also doesn't switch over to the satellite alternatives.

[Tombie]

The problem with this service, and Apples emergency service is low signal performance.

I did a pushbike ride last year in WA, and spent a significant amount of time with one bar of Telstra. With that amount of signal you can't really do anything with the phone, but it also doesn't switch over to the satellite alternatives.

You can override to satellite if required.

[Captain_Rightfoot]

You can override to satellite if required.
As far as I'm aware there is no way to do that.

AI gave me this. If you've got some way of doing it let me know!


There’s no official way to “force” Starlink as the preferred network
Unlike switching mobile carriers or manually selecting networks (which you can do with cellular networks), Starlink satellite service isn’t exposed as a selectable carrier in the iPhone settings — it is only used when your phone cannot see Telstra’s normal mobile network. You can’t force it to prefer satellite if there’s Telstra coverage present.

[Epic_Dragon]

has anyone been given the mini router for free? We were but not sure how it compares performance wise to the original home router. (Gen1) Updates are due to end for the gen 1 router soon, so not sure if this mini is a good substitute with wi fi signal?

[Captain_Rightfoot]

Since the MINI I don't know why anyone would bother with a separate router unless you have one of the early dishes without a router, or you are trying to use a MINI for home/domestic use in which case you may want a router.

[Tombie]

As far as I'm aware there is no way to do that.

AI gave me this. If you've got some way of doing it let me know!

You can force satellite for emergency when it cannot get an sms out via landnet

[Captain_Rightfoot]

You can force satellite for emergency when it cannot get an sms out via landnet
Everything I've seen suggests there is no way to do that. Can you provide a link at all?

[shack]

I've got an S25 which can also do SMS via SAT, but it's pretty sketchy as to whether or works or not.

When it does work it can send SMS and MMS, but a lot of the time it won't work for me.

I also haven't found a way to force SAT service.

However, once on the SAT, it doesn't like searching for the local tower again, at this stage it seems a bit Alpha.

Luckily I don't rely on it.

[Tins]

Everything I read suggests iPhone cannot be forced to use satellite, but it will automatically when there's no coverage. Trouble is most articles are US based, and their "cellular" network is vastly different to ours.

[Tombie]

It first became useful for me heading to
One of my mine sites, not a spot of coverage.

[Captain_Rightfoot]

Everything I read suggests iPhone cannot be forced to use satellite, but it will automatically when there's no coverage. Trouble is most articles are US based, and their "cellular" network is vastly different to ours.
Ok, cool. That's my understanding, and experience.

You have to be out of coverage, and for a little while before it will switch over. Hence my criticism of the service - if you have one or two bars of mobile service you probably can't do much and you also can't get satellite.

[Tins]

Ok, cool. That's my understanding, and experience.

You have to be out of coverage, and for a little while before it will switch over. Hence my criticism of the service - if you have one or two bars of mobile service you probably can't do much and you also can't get satellite.

For me, the question is, is that down to Telstra or the sat service? If in fact they are different. Seems to me that this is an other plus for getting Starlink. Their residential plan now includes a free Mini to take with you. Still a little beyond my budget, but I can wait. Not going anywhere for a while.

[Captain_Rightfoot]

For me, the question is, is that down to Telstra or the sat service? If in fact they are different. Seems to me that this is an other plus for getting Starlink. Their residential plan now includes a free Mini to take with you. Still a little beyond my budget, but I can wait. Not going anywhere for a while.
All you can do with the telsra version of starlink is send texts. So it's quite limited.

Having a Starlink is next level. It's just like being at home.

[Tins]

It's just like being at home.

You mean outages and wild speed variations? I'd kinda hoped SL would fix all that......[bighmmm]

Seriously though, with FTTN costing $90 unlimited but low speeds, and now FTTC being offered with a $10 extra charge, NBN are pricing themselves out of the market here. but SL will hit me with a $244 "demand surcharge" upfront. They throw in a free SL Mini for roaming. If I was still working I wouldn't hesitate.

[Captain_Rightfoot]

You mean outages and wild speed variations? I'd kinda hoped SL would fix all that......[bighmmm]

Seriously though, with FTTN costing $90 unlimited but low speeds, and now FTTC being offered with a $10 extra charge, NBN are pricing themselves out of the market here. but SL will hit me with a $244 "demand surcharge" upfront. They throw in a free SL Mini for roaming. If I was still working I wouldn't hesitate.
I think due to the technical nature of things it's hard for SL to provide connectivity in large centres. I think they are suggesting they will do it if you really want to.. and controlling uptake with price.

We lost NBN for a few days and I set up the Mini on the roof. The inbuilt router which works so well in the bush struggled to get through the house structures.

[Tombie]

I think due to the technical nature of things it's hard for SL to provide connectivity in large centres. I think they are suggesting they will do it if you really want to.. and controlling uptake with price.

We lost NBN for a few days and I set up the Mini on the roof. The inbuilt router which works so well in the bush struggled to get through the house structures.

Good thing is the Mini has a RJ port, so in cases of home use, a quick hook up with a patch lead sorts the system to use your existing network.

Can even get POE adapters to hook net and power to a mini for home use.

[Captain_Rightfoot]

Good thing is the Mini has a RJ port, so in cases of home use, a quick hook up with a patch lead sorts the system to use your existing network.

Can even get POE adapters to hook net and power to a mini for home use.
Yep. I've seen it but haven't tried it.

I was surprised at the poor performance of it in built up areas. Mounted on the roof of the car the range in the bush is ample. Like probably up to a couple of hundred metres. There is no way I'd bother with a router in that environment.

[Tombie]

Same experience.

Ours are roof rack mounted and can be used for a long way around the vehicle.
Work perfectly in caravans nearby also.

I haven’t tried the mini with router, and at home the Gen 3 just connected to my UniFi rack so it’s doing nothing with its own wifi

[Tins]

I think due to the technical nature of things it's hard for SL to provide connectivity in large centres. I think they are suggesting they will do it if you really want to.. and controlling uptake with price.

We lost NBN for a few days and I set up the Mini on the roof. The inbuilt router which works so well in the bush struggled to get through the house structures.
Pretty much. Seems like they want to sorta discourage people from getting SL when the NBN is available. If it wasn’t for the budget constraints it wouldn’t discourage me. SL is exactly the kind of visionary tech I love.

[Tombie]

Pretty much. Seems like they want to sorta discourage people from getting SL when the NBN is available. If it wasn’t for the budget constraints it wouldn’t discourage me. SL is exactly the kind of visionary tech I love.

And it works; Well. Our home unit has been magnitudes of reliable over our previous NBN connections.

I have the Mini on the D4 and the unit for the Fuso sitting here waiting on the trucks arrival.

The phrase is radically over used nowadays, however Starlink is truly a Game Changer when it comes to mobile comms.

[Tins]

And it works; Well. Our home unit has been magnitudes of reliable over our previous NBN connections.



Not sure that's what I wanted to hear, Mike. [bigsad]. Still, one day.

[gavinwibrow]

And it works; Well. Our home unit has been magnitudes of reliable over our previous NBN connections.

I have the Mini on the D4 and the unit for the Fuso sitting here waiting on the trucks arrival.

The phrase is radically over used nowadays, however Starlink is truly a Game Changer when it comes to mobile comms.


So Mike, just to confirm for this pedantic but dumb old bastard, is it feasible to withdraw from NBN and just use Starlink if you live in the city (in my case Perth/Fremantle)? I get the bit about away reception, which of course is a no brainer.

[Captain_Rightfoot]

So Mike, just to confirm for this pedantic but dumb old bastard, is it feasible to withdraw from NBN and just use Starlink if you live in the city (in my case Perth/Fremantle)? I get the bit about away reception, which of course is a no brainer.

The residential plan is 139 a month. Probably NBN cheaper.

I don't think you can move the dish on that plan.

So roam is $80 for 100gb, or 195 unlimited.

Once you have a starlink they ask for $9 a month for standby.

[Tombie]

So Mike, just to confirm for this pedantic but dumb old bastard, is it feasible to withdraw from NBN and just use Starlink if you live in the city (in my case Perth/Fremantle)? I get the bit about away reception, which of course is a no brainer.

Not sure how your “congestion” is over there - if it’s high SL will want to charge more.

For a normal home account there are 3 tiers:

Std home 100Mbps
Plus 200Mbps
Max - open

The max is $139/mth
Plus $99/mth
Std $69/mth

For most people the Std will do, if you have LOTs of devices and stream on several simultaneously then Plus is suitable.

At the moment they will give you a mini as well so you can have a roaming set up.

[Tins]

Where I am I can only get the Residential Max plan, with the $234 surcharge. This includes a free mini but not a plan to go with it. It’s a good plan but more than I can really afford. I can’t get the $69 plan which would be perfect for me for now. But the prices keep coming down. Maybe.

[Captain_Rightfoot]

So I learnt something new. There are different plans for MINI/normal. Actually maybe I knew that but either way.

How does it work if you have just one dish? Like a home one but what if you travel sometimes?

[Graeme]

Yesterday at my place my son's fancy folding mobile phone on a Telstra a/c switched to satellite when it couldn't get reception.

[Captain_Rightfoot]

Yesterday at my place my son's fancy folding mobile phone on a Telstra a/c switched to satellite when it couldn't get reception.
For text only!

[Tombie]

So I learnt something new. There are different plans for MINI/normal. Actually maybe I knew that but either way.

How does it work if you have just one dish? Like a home one but what if you travel sometimes?

You have to swap it over on the app to go mobile.

It’s much easier to get a second unit

[Tombie]

For text only!

Even that on its own is an amazing leap in technology when you think about it.

[Graeme]

He was accessing the internet.

[Captain_Rightfoot]

He was accessing the internet.
Can you ask him how he's doing it for us? AFAIK it's text only.


Telstra Satellite Messaging lets eligible customers send and receive text messages from their compatible mobile phone via satellite when beyond the range of our mobile network.

Satellite texting and satellite messages now available from Telstra (https://www.telstra.com.au/coverage-networks/mobile-technology/satellite-to-mobile)

[scarry]

Can you ask him how he's doing it for us? AFAIK it's text only.



Satellite texting and satellite messages now available from Telstra (https://www.telstra.com.au/coverage-networks/mobile-technology/satellite-to-mobile)


Can use an Iphone,any from 13 onwards,i know someone who has been doing it for the last month or so,and has had no issues.

No extra cost if on a telstra mobile plan.

[Captain_Rightfoot]

Can use an Iphone,any from 13 onwards,i know someone who has been doing it for the last month or so,and has had no issues.

No extra cost if on a telstra mobile plan.
So I have used it too. I know about it all good. But it only sends texts. Graham said his son was using it for internet. I would like to know more.

If you read about it though.. it's pretty slow and everythign has to be right. Like you need to be outside etc etc. A text could take some time to send.

For my use in the race, having Starlink on the roof and always working providing instant communication.. so good.

[Graeme]

My son just stated that he didn't try, only that his phone showed satellite for both calls and data.

Edit: my phone, whilst only 2 years old, isn't on Telstra's list of compatible phones.

[Captain_Rightfoot]

My son just stated that he didn't try, only that his phone showed satellite for both calls and data.

Edit: my phone, whilst only 2 yeaars old, isn't on Telstra's list of compatible phones.

Thanks!

Re your phone.. that's a shame.

It's worth noting that you have to be on the right plan. So even if you have the right phone and teslra you might not have any luck. Telstra resellers are excluded.

Personally I think it's a great backup in case your starlink dish falls off the roof. [wink11]

You have your iphone emergency which also works via globalstar. I'm unsure how the two work together.



Telstra Satellite Messaging is included on Consumer and Small Business Telstra Upfront Mobile Plans. You also need a compatible phone with the latest software.

** JB Hi-Fi and The Good Guys Upfront Plans are excluded.

Satellite texting and satellite messages now available from Telstra (https://www.telstra.com.au/coverage-networks/mobile-technology/satellite-to-mobile)

[Graeme]

A screen-shot from my son's phone shows across the top:
calls - ask always
messages - Telstra SpaceX
mobile - Telstra SpaceX

[shack]

From the Telstra website.
https://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/20260209/8e41c2df918453bcf2e7a8c2d3f0d2d5.jpg

[shack]

I thought I sent an MMS over satellite last week, and I may have...

It's also possible that the phone grabbed a 5G tower that it occasionally connects too when we head north from home.

[Tins]

Telstra resellers are excluded.



Indeed. I wonder how long that will last. Seems a trifle monopolistic to me. But what do I know?

[Tins]

Seems that Optus (https://www.optus.com.au/living-network/coverage/leosat) is going to get on the act as well. But of course they will.

[Tins]

Can use an Iphone,any from 13 onwards,i know someone who has been doing it for the last month or so,and has had no issues.

No extra cost if on a telstra mobile plan.

Hmm. 's own site (https://support.apple.com/en-au/105097) says that sat messaging only works with the 14 and on.

I was hoping you were correct, Paul, because I have a 13 Pro I see no reason to update currently.

The SL Residential Max plan, with the Mini thrown in, is getting more attractive by the minute.

[Captain_Rightfoot]

Indeed. I wonder how long that will last. Seems a trifle monopolistic to me. But what do I know?
Telstra have a long history of trying to erect competitive barriers to other carriers. I can remember a couple of times the government has forced them to allow others onto their network and then they just start working extra fast on a newer better one that no one can access. But then we did sell them off to private investors so we should expect this.

IMHO the primary reason why Telstra can command a premium, and why they have so many customers is their remote coverage. I think they are trying to cream as much profit as they can before starlink gets it.

Out bush there are already dishes on cars everywhere. I can imagine it's a total game changer.

It's when not if all phones will become satellite phones and use the likes of starlink. I know there are some technical challenges (electrically phased array size) but it will happen. In the meantime MINI's will be everywhere.

Is Starlink really making a phone? Elon Musk says no, but hints at a ‘different device’ with AI powers | TechRadar (https://www.techradar.com/phones/is-starlink-really-making-a-phone-elon-musk-says-no-but-hints-at-a-different-device-with-ai-powers)

[Captain_Rightfoot]

I love how farmers can buy a mini dish and then put it on standby and use that and a webcam to monitor remote facilities like pumps. 399 for a dish, and $10 a month. As long as you can power it.

[TonyC]

I love how farmers can buy a mini dish and then put it on standby and use that and a webcam to monitor remote facilities like pumps. 399 for a dish, and $10 a month. As long as you can power it.

From what I see on the Star Link support site, when paused you still get 500 kb/s.
Is this enough to do wifi calling?
I assume TXT and email without huge attachments would work OK.

I can see a mini in my future.
It looks like a Star Link residential is less than we are currently paying for our fixed wireless.

Tony

[Captain_Rightfoot]

From what I see on the Star Link support site, when paused you still get 500 kb/s.
Is this enough to do wifi calling?
I assume TXT and email without huge attachments would work OK.

I can see a mini in my future.
It looks like a Star Link residential is less than we are currently paying for our fixed wireless.

Tony
When I bought my mini you could pause it when not in use. No cost.

But late last year they bought in standby. You are supposed to be able to make a call and certainly text, but probably not really browsing.

But it's easy to activate your unit for a short time. If your monthly bill date is the end of the month, and you need it from the 20th you can activate it for a few days and only pay 10/30ths worth of charge. Just remember to put it back on standby before the end of the month.

[Tins]

Telstra have a long history of trying to erect competitive barriers to other carriers. I can remember a couple of times the government has forced them to allow others onto their network and then they just start working extra fast on a newer better one that no one can access. But then we did sell them off to private investors so we should expect this.

IMHO the primary reason why Telstra can command a premium, and why they have so many customers is their remote coverage. I think they are trying to cream as much profit as they can before starlink gets it.

Out bush there are already dishes on cars everywhere. I can imagine it's a total game changer.

It's when not if all phones will become satellite phones and use the likes of starlink. I know there are some technical challenges (electrically phased array size) but it will happen. In the meantime MINI's will be everywhere.

Is Starlink really making a phone? Elon Musk says no, but hints at a ‘different device’ with AI powers | TechRadar (https://www.techradar.com/phones/is-starlink-really-making-a-phone-elon-musk-says-no-but-hints-at-a-different-device-with-ai-powers)
That’s sort of what I mean. Starlink is leapfrogging everyone. The NBN will wind up being the waste of money I always thought it would. I get that Telstra wants to forestall all of this for as long as possible so they remain the big player. But unless they get on board they will become irrelevant to the consumer. Enterprise is a totally different matter of course.

[Captain_Rightfoot]

That’s sort of what I mean. Starlink is leapfrogging everyone. The NBN will wind up being the waste of money I always thought it would. I get that Telstra wants to forestall all of this for as long as possible so they remain the big player. But unless they get on board they will become irrelevant to the consumer. Enterprise is a totally different matter of course.
The NBN is a slightly different discussion. I just don't think Starlink wants or can really do that market. They just don't have the capacity.

But in the bush it's a different deal. I can see telcos shrinking back to large population areas and abandoning everything else to starlink.

It's a separate conversation about whether Australia should allow themselves to become completely dependent on a foreign company for an essential service. But we can deal with that later I suppose.

Remember NBN is essentially just Telstra 2.0. We sold Telstra 1 and then they wouldn't do what we wanted them to. We then built Telstra 2.0.

[scarry]

Hmm. 's own site (https://support.apple.com/en-au/105097) says that sat messaging only works with the 14 and on.

I was hoping you were correct, Paul, because I have a 13 Pro I see no reason to update currently.

The SL Residential Max plan, with the Mini thrown in, is getting more attractive by the minute.

You are looking at Apple Satellite.

I was looking at Telstra Satellite.

I have a Mini 13,so will be Ok on Telstra,although i usually leave it at home.While away,we use Mrs Scarry's,as it doesn't get work calls.
Hers is only 6 months old so should be OK.
As long as on a Telstra plan,which we are,no extra cost for satellite.

SO yours will be fine if on a Telstra plan.

[Fattima]

From what I see on the Star Link support site, when paused you still get 500 kb/s.
Is this enough to do wifi calling?
I assume TXT and email without huge attachments would work OK.


I tested this a little while back while up in Murray Sunset NP. Calling worked just fine and my other half was able to slowly look up some E-Bird data. I do wonder in Starlink will slow it down or stop it in the future, $8.50 a month for calling is a bargain.

[Graeme]

I thought I sent an MMS over satellite last week, and I may have...
Apparently when Telstra announced satellite support some time ago, text was the initial support but that the system would be expanded in the future to include calls and data. It seems that at least data is now supported to some degree even though not shown on the website.

[Captain_Rightfoot]

Apparently when Telstra announced satellite support some time ago, text was the initial support but that the system would be expanded in the future to include calls and data. It seems that at least data is now supported to some degree even though not shown on the website.
Interesting will be keen to try it. It's very hard to find anywhere in SEQ that has no coverage. [bigwhistle]

It's worth noting that the apple emergency service is Find My Friends and Emergency only (although text in other countries). No texting, calls, data. Because it's globalstar and not starlink you are back to "point phone this way at sky and wait".... Apple officially say that they only offer it for the first two years of phone ownership.. so only for new devices. Although.. this is very murky. I've been unable to find any evidence of them cutting people off or knocking back a call for help. We used this service in WA on a bike ride (Find My Friends). It does work.

I assume that the Telstra starlink service takes precedence over the apple service. I'm not sure if you could use the apple service without removing the sim card?

[Tombie]

Apple doesn’t use Globalstar at all..
The emergency function pre-SL was all phone network.

[Captain_Rightfoot]

Apple doesn’t use Globalstar at all..
The emergency function pre-SL was all phone network.

It does sorry. Check it out.


Satellite network for Apple satellite features provided by Globalstar, Inc. and its affiliates or third-party network providers.

Connect to a satellite with your iPhone – Apple Support (AU) (https://support.apple.com/en-au/105097#:~:text=Emergency%20SOS%20via%20satellite%2 0connects,or%20third%2Dparty%20network%20providers .)

[Captain_Rightfoot]

I do really like to know when travelling remotely that there is an alternate nework available even though the apple connectivity is very limited.

[Tombie]

It does sorry. Check it out.



Connect to a satellite with your iPhone – Apple Support (AU) (https://support.apple.com/en-au/105097#:~:text=Emergency%20SOS%20via%20satellite%2 0connects,or%20third%2Dparty%20network%20providers .)

Strange - Mine never shows Sat without the Starlink banner…

Perhaps Apple uses it for those not using an SL provider.

[Captain_Rightfoot]

Strange - Mine never shows Sat without the Starlink banner…

Perhaps Apple uses it for those not using an SL provider.
That's what I was saying earlier. I'm not sure it will use the apple system while Telstra is sending you to starlink. Perhaps you'd have to take out the sim. I don't know. Before Telstra starlink colab my phone would willingly use the apple satellite emergency when out of signal.

Here is a demo. You can also get a demo. Go to Emergency SOS in settings and down the bottom of the page is "Emergency SOS via Satellite" You can click. "try demo"


https://youtu.be/V35jHAkpUIk?si=Wbk8KqV3Xp7hqTjF

[scarry]

That's what I was saying earlier. I'm not sure it will use the apple system while Telstra is sending you to starlink. Perhaps you'd have to take out the sim. I don't know. Before Telstra starlink colab my phone would willingly use the apple satellite emergency when out of signal.

Here is a demo. You can also get a demo. Go to Emergency SOS in settings and down the bottom of the page is "Emergency SOS via Satellite" You can click. "try demo"


https://youtu.be/V35jHAkpUIk?si=Wbk8KqV3Xp7hqTjF

My Iphone13 mini has that setting,exactly as in the Vid.....

[Tins]

So, I opened the SL app to see if anything has changed. Well, yes, it has. It now gives me three tiers of connectivity, and no surcharge. $99 for $69. 200 for $99, and the same Max plan. I'm currently paying $85 for 50, if I get it.

What am I waiting for? For it not to be too good to be true.

The grass doesn't grow on this mob.

[Captain_Rightfoot]

So, I opened the SL app to see if anything has changed. Well, yes, it has. It now gives me three tiers of connectivity, and no surcharge. $99 for $69. 200 for $99, and the same Max plan. I'm currently paying $85 for 50, if I get it.

What am I waiting for? For it not to be too good to be true.

The grass doesn't grow on this mob.
What am I missing? is there a special on? [bigsmile]

[Tins]

What am I missing? is there a special on? [bigsmile]

Only that a week ago I could only have the Residential Max package $140 pm, with a $250 surcharge, sure with a Mini thrown in. I couldn't justify that.

[Tins]

Order placed. Let the cable cutting begin.

[Tins]

Large flat box arrived. Found a place to temporarily set it up ( they tell me that people my age shouldn't climb ladders.... ), plugged it in and did my best Mr Bean impersonation running around with my phone looking for dots.Got it aligned, after arguing with it... "I had to point Foxtel North to Optus B!" Starlink points South... well, up really, but South Up. All good, Getting consistently double the speed, for $30 less. Efficient, this mob. Especially the billing department. No sooner had I got the thing connected to the heavens than an email arrived with my first bill.... But I think I'm going to like it. And I'll get a mini for when ( if ) I go bush.

[Captain_Rightfoot]

So big news - the starlink standby mode no longer works in motion. So people with it on cars using it to make calls are out of luck. You'll need to step up to the roam plans. It can still be used while stationary though.

Roam is limited to 100mph so should be fine in the defender.

[Tins]

Roam is limited to 100mph so should be fine in the defender.

Damn. No use on the OKA then.......

[V8Ian]

Damn. No use on the OKA then.......
Do you have intentions of doing some off cliff driving? [biggrin]

[Tins]

Do you have intentions of doing some off cliff driving? [biggrin]

North Head wouldn't be high enough. Maybe a C-17 Globemaster III.

[Captain_Rightfoot]

North Head wouldn't be high enough. Maybe a C-17 Globemaster III.

So there is uproar in the aviation community.. heaps of private pilots were mounting starlinks in the back window and using roam plans to get all their weather and stuff while flying. Very handy I would think.

But the 160mph thing means it's not really very useful for most and they have introduced aviation plans which are quite a lot more expensive and vary by speed. For most private pilots the $250 a month is probably a bit steep.


Starlink Aviation Service Plans



Aviation 300MPH ($250/month): Designed for aircraft speeds up to 300 mph (https://www.aulro.com/afvb/image/gif;base64,R0lGODlhAQABAIAAAP/wAAACH5BAEAAAAALAAAAAABAAEAAAICRAEAOw==482km/h
482km/h
). Includes 20GB of data, with 10GB/GB overage options. Coverage includes land and within 12 nautical miles of the coast.
Aviation 450MPH ($1,000/month): Designed for faster aircraft, up to 450 mph (https://www.aulro.com/afvb/image/gif;base64,R0lGODlhAQABAIAAAP/wAAACH5BAEAAAAALAAAAAABAAEAAAICRAEAOw==724km/h
724km/h
). Includes 20GB of data, https://www.aulro.com/afvb/image/gif;base64,R0lGODlhAQABAIAAAP/wAAACH5BAEAAAAALAAAAAABAAEAAAICRAEAOw==50/GB
50/GB
overage, and extends coverage to include ocean/global, not just coastal.
Business Aviation Plans ($2,000+ /month): Higher-tier, unlimited, or higher-data plans for corporate jets with global coverage.

[BradC]

Damn. No use on the OKA then.......

Do they differentiate between horizontal and vertical speed velocity?

[Captain_Rightfoot]

Do they differentiate between horizontal and vertical speed velocity?

Good point. It would be horizontal speed I reckon. If you could find a big enough cliff you could blog till the end.

[prelude]

I guess they did not want people to use it for navigation (0.5mbps is just enough) whilst on the road. The reason you get the slow speed is in case of emergency and that you can reactivate your plan when not having cellular coverage (and thus no MFA login access). Practically no need for that whilst moving I guess?

Also the lower speed "in air" MIGHT be because of certain prolific drone use, MAYBE they are worried about starlink mini's being abused?

In any case. I get it. People find a way to use what they get and if that runs out of control, you need to regulate it again... Personally, I found out what you could do with standby a bit too late. At first I was like: that's nice and will work for me, but now I am back to: standby is way to expensive. I need to pay just to have the bloody thing stored in a dark shed without a view of the sky.

-P

[Captain_Rightfoot]

I guess they did not want people to use it for navigation (0.5mbps is just enough) whilst on the road. The reason you get the slow speed is in case of emergency and that you can reactivate your plan when not having cellular coverage (and thus no MFA login access). Practically no need for that whilst moving I guess?

Also the lower speed "in air" MIGHT be because of certain prolific drone use, MAYBE they are worried about starlink mini's being abused?

In any case. I get it. People find a way to use what they get and if that runs out of control, you need to regulate it again... Personally, I found out what you could do with standby a bit too late. At first I was like: that's nice and will work for me, but now I am back to: standby is way to expensive. I need to pay just to have the bloody thing stored in a dark shed without a view of the sky.

-P

You can just cancel your plan when not in use. I have not done it but apparently it's fine for people using roam. If you are using residential there maybe issues.

I expect I'll be using mine quite a bit this year so it's probably easier to stay on standby. If I wasn't going to use it for several months I'd definitely try cancelling.

When I bought the mini you could pause it for no cost. :(

I don't read this as an anti drone thing becasue they can tailor behaviour by region. This is all about trying to get more yield from every dish. If you are a light AC pilot you need to pay more. If you have a faster plane you probably have more money so you can pay more too. All the way up to private jet speeds which is mega expensive. Starlink is not a public service - it's a company trying to make $$$$


https://youtu.be/J_fihCCV-yo?si=35eHlW-uQmgXmsCg

[Tombie]

Besides my current gen Dishy on the house, I have 2 SL mini units. Both currently paused and not fussed I pay the small fee to keep them.
They still update etc when powered in this mode.

And they’re there ready to go whenever I want them on.

The new roam plan with double data and then shaping is handy for the shorter term use cases.

Rather have it and not need it [emoji41]

[Tins]

Do they differentiate between horizontal and vertical speed velocity?

Newton says so, but Starlink? Dunno. Yesterday they moved me to Auckland, which would challenge even the OKA. Not to mention, if I choose to move it won't be to NZ.

[Captain_Rightfoot]

Minor change to MINI network settings which might help people who leave their device ignition powered.


https://youtu.be/bVO9kT7b3qM?si=LsAe4Xtv7BI19HXR

[Narangga]

Finally arrived. 100Mbps plan with free hardware.
195931

[Tins]

Finally arrived. 100Mbps plan with free hardware.
195931
Have fun with all the dots….. But I was up and running super fast.

[Tins]

The whole process took less time than it did to cancel iinet.

[Narangga]

Have fun with all the dots….. But I was up and running super fast.

Join all the dots or decipher the images without any wording...

The greatest amount of time was climbing up and down the 6.5m extension ladder onto the roof putting it up there. [bigwhistle]

[oka374]

Even if you have your Starlink disconnected it's a good idea to shove it out in the yard every month or so and let it do software updates so that when you do actually want to use it it doesn't spend a while doing them before it actually operates. It will still update if disconnected.
Also it will reach a point like many did last year that if not updated by XX date they become a brick. You would think that if Starlink advised that the dish must be turned on to do updates by XX date or it would be bricked then most would have done it, but apparently there were lots that didn't.

[Captain_Rightfoot]

Even if you have your Starlink disconnected it's a good idea to shove it out in the yard every month or so and let it do software updates so that when you do actually want to use it it doesn't spend a while doing them before it actually operates. It will still update if disconnected.
Also it will reach a point like many did last year that if not updated by XX date they become a brick. You would think that if Starlink advised that the dish must be turned on to do updates by XX date or it would be bricked then most would have done it, but apparently there were lots that didn't.
I just asked AI, and it said that in rare situations where dish is off for over 12 months they can require a manual update from support.

I've left mine off for over six months and no problem. I do very occasionally put it out for a bit to do the updates.

[oka374]

That big update last year Starlink sent messages for quite a few months beforehand and there were also articles in news and other outlets that if the dish had been off for a long while and it wasn't updated by XX date then it would be bricked. There were still people that ignored the warning and then complained that their dish no longer functioned.

[Tins]

Join all the dots or decipher the images without any wording...



Yes. And I have lots of trees, just to confuse the issue even more.

[Narangga]

Yes. And I have lots of trees, just to confuse the issue even more.

Fortunately my trees higher than the house (a tad over 7m at the ridgecap where I placed it) are mostly east and west of the house - not south!

[Captain_Rightfoot]

That big update last year Starlink sent messages for quite a few months beforehand and there were also articles in news and other outlets that if the dish had been off for a long while and it wasn't updated by XX date then it would be bricked. There were still people that ignored the warning and then complained that their dish no longer functioned.
I don't rembember getting any emails about that. [bigwhistle]

[prelude]

I don't rembember getting any emails about that. [bigwhistle]

Neither do I and I have had my starlink for years now. In the beginning I tested it once to see what's what, used it on my yearly trip and then stored it for almost a year (10-11 months) before taking it out, putting it up before I left on a trip and just leaving it there for 24hours. Things went just fine :)

This was the gen 2 dish and not the mini but still. My mini has been stored for, oh I dunno, almost a year now? I guess 10 months and won't be reactivated until june and by the end of this month my gen 2 will be stored, possibly for a lot lot longer since I will have gigabit fibre in the new house. Unpacking and storing that thing takes a lot more effort so I am not sure if it will get out even once a year.

I have the mini paused and I am not sure if I will pause the gen 2 or simply cancel it. I still kinda dislike the whole pausing thing since with two of them they are putting me in a hard spot paying 120bucks per year just to keep them around... (and I would normally only use 1 once a year for 1 month)

on a different note: the gen 2 being auto aim (still like that!) aimed itself last year in a certain direction. I had many drop outs during summer, heavy rain and sometimes during snow but since the leaves went last fall everything did get better. Recently I arrived home and looked at the roof to find the dish had pointed it self differently, perhaps due to the number of satellites in the constellation or some other reason. if the gen 2 can and actually does do that, I wonder how many people with fixed dishes are in a suboptimal state or need to get up on the roof (or wherever) to re-align their dishies?

-P

[oka374]

I kept the gen 2 for just that reason as it would often when set up for a month in one spot slowly move to a slightly different direction. Once it died and Starlink replaced it with a gen 3 for nothing after nearly three years the gen3 hasn't moved since I put it up on the roof and still is happily aligned according to the app.

[Captain_Rightfoot]

I find it amazing how good the electrically phased array (try saying that three times quick).

When I got the mini (and it was one of the first)I thought I was going to have to align it. But quickly worked out it doesn't care. Maybe works better if aligned but mostly doesn't matter.

They are also very tolerant of obstructions. I hear that when they switched them off in UKR one of the issues the russians are having is most of the alternatives need a really obstruction free location. Which means they are easily spotted. The starlinks are very tolerant of obstructions.

[prelude]

I am still trying to get my head around it's performance to be fair. Here is the deal: I have both the gen 2 and the mini. I prefer the mini not for its size but the fact that I can hook an ethernet cable up directly. I used both of them extensively and where possible I use the mini but where I need better and more reliable speeds I use the gen2. My mini never got over say 150mbit and the gen 2 does 300 when it wants to.

Here's the thing though, the mini has much less array area and thus obstructions do tend to hurt it sooner than the gen2. Also its built-in wifi is not great. I tried placing it on top of the roof of this house and my mac pro did not get a signal, barely 7m away due to obstructions no doubt. Same in the previous location where it sat outside slightly elevated from the floor to clear the grass in a spot with the least amount of trees. Again 5m away from the house I could not get decent wifi speeds (but I had the ethernet cable).

In my current location I have found that with say 15-20% of coverage due to trees (leaves mostly) I had several outages per 15 minutes. So yes, you can hide them more easily but it is not at all clear that you can use them reliably to me. It must be said that I did use the starlink in an area where there were multiple around me for quite some time. (I lived on a park that houses 650+ ukranian refugees) and some had the means to run their own starlink. Since a couple of months the goverment provided the entire park (all bungalows) with gigabit fibre and most if not all the starlink dishes were turned off, except for ours. The performance has since significantly increased.

Long story short: I think the performance of starlink is great for what it is, but I also feel like it is overstated at times but then again I have never had to deal with Australian broadband [bighmmm] I am moving next week to a larger bungalow where I will have gigabit fibre with my own edgerouter for 50 pop a month again, no limits, so we ARE spoiled over here...

Cheers,
-P