So, part of Musk's long-term play here has got to be, eventually, to include a Starlink terminal into every Tesla, right? Probably without even charging any subscription. You and your passengers get free broadband internet in the car, and Tesla get a high-bandwidth channel to every vehicle on the road, allowing them to stream live, high-fidelity telemetry data back to their HQ and push out software updates as and when they need to.
In the developing world, we've seen a leapfrog effect in telecoms - they skipped over fixed-line phones and went straight to mobile phones. It's far easier to blanket a rural area or a dense slum with 3G signal than to run wires to every house.
That poses a problem when you need fast fixed broadband - there's only so much mobile spectrum to go around, you can't really cheat the Shannon-Hartley theorem, so you end up with tight data caps and unreliable performance. Rolling out fixed infrastructure can be prohibitively expensive, so a lot of areas are stuck on mobile-only.
Low-orbit satellite broadband potentially breaks this dilemma. The low orbit provides tolerable latency (within 30ms of fixed broadband), there's an abundance of spectrum in the Ku and Ka bands and you can steer a tight beam with a phased array. Starlink and OneWeb could potentially offer a satellite broadband product that is competitive with fixed-line broadband on cost, latency and bandwidth, but that is available almost anywhere on earth. Becoming the default broadband provider for half the world's population is Kind Of A Big Deal - maybe enough of a big deal to bankroll a Mars mission.
I think there's obvious potential for this to be Kind Of A Big Deal on a purely personal level. Is your local cable monopoly absolutely terrible? Within a couple of years, it might not be a monopoly any more. Huge amounts of rural real estate becomes a heck of a lot more attractive if literally everywhere has good broadband. This might just be one of those once-in-a-generation technologies that meaningfully changes human geography.
No, that's not the plan. To work with these low-orbit fast moving satellites, the antennas would be then size of a model 3 hood, pretty fancy/expensive and probably more than a little power hungry.
The cars will use LTE, although the backbone of those base stations could very well be Starlink.
Maybe future iterations will have extra hardware for terminal friendly applications, but I'd guess you'll see level 4 autonomy in a model 3 before they can upgrade Stsrlink to do that.
One day they could possibly teleop cars autonomously (streaming sensor data to servers through the starlink terminals, then processing and sending output data back to the cars through the starlink terminals). Obviously latency is a huge factor in this, but it could be possible.
I would also like to see low orbit shielded datacenters. These would have relatively high mass and streamlined design, which would allow for radiation shielding, and reduce the necessity of boosting orbital trajectory. They would also have very high bandwidth line of sight laser communications. This would allow them to migrate the state of virtual servers to the next satellite over. So applications consisting of a cloud of server processes can incrementally migrate to virtually "hover" at very low altitudes above the earth.
Assuming Starlink also works, I suspect the first company to make this work would make an absolute killing.
Turn every supercharger station into a LTE provider then put a dish on it and you're there. I'm glad spaceX isn't on the public market though. So we'll actually have a chance of seeing some of these ambitious goals come true.
No, they can only service a limited number of customers within a given region. The only users of Starlink, et al. in major metropolitan areas will be backbone providers.
Very excited about this. What's interesting is the deployment mechanism, where they almost use the momentum of the rocket to "fling" the 60 tightly packed satellites away from the booster, and then after about 3 hours they fire up the Krypton ion thrusters and start the course correction phase. IIRC the only other times this deployment mechanism is used is on tiny CubeSats where they opt for this more conglomerating type of deployment due to the durability of the CubeSats.
Will definitely be getting service for some family members in Northern Africa where incredibly slow speeds are charged high prices if Starlink can compete on price.
Last night at the sat. launch there was almost no fling effect. They slowly floated away in a group, hardly separated. I thought they could have had some mechanical problem.
This is an amazing achievement. The pace at which SpaceX is doing things is nothing short of a miracle. Congratulations team SpaceX. I can only feel envy at the super cool engineering being done there.
This is probably the biggest threat ever to autocratic governments worldwide - government independent communication. Whereas conventional broadband and cell requires government sanction (to build towers, control frequency bands, build infrastructure, censor messages) and conventional communication requires physical meeting and distribution, Starlink breaks their grip hold. If people everywhere have unrestricted access to a market driven www without being limited by autocratic governments and dictators, communication and rallying together will proceed unimpeded. Starlink should be setup with absolute transparency.
As a foreigner living in China, I'm wondering if such network can be technically prevented from being used in covered land/countries? How cool would it be to finally get an unrestricted access to the Internet here.
Most probably, to use Starlink, they would have to abide by local laws and regulation. So in the case of China, I don't think the connection would be any different from what you can find consumer ISPs today. Or Starlink simply skips China.
It depends on how conspicuous the transmitter/receiver is. The authorities could just roll up and confiscate your antenna if such is easily visible and uncommon. Or deploy a jammer in your area. I think it would be about as safe as operating a pirate radio station.
Presumably once enough of the network is up, SpaceX will have an "all orbit" telemetry setup using their own network.That would free them from using the NASA network and maybe we'd get to see drone ship video that didn't always cut out at the landing :-).
One of my managers from Sun, Don Hoffman, left and went on as an early employee of Teledesic, a LEO satellite broadband company in 1990 :-). But the prohibitive cost to get to space, and the size of their satellites, ultimately doomed them.
Starlink is a good example of an idea that failed but could succeed now because technology has moved far enough forward to actually do what the engineers envisioned in a more cost effective way.
That said, its a risky move for SpaceX which has the potential to be considered as having a launch monopoly given their costs structure, and using that to get into adjacent markets is something that is the kind of thing that antitrust lawyers go after.
This is the only thing that would allow SpaceX to have non-linear growth and ultimately fund their grander ambitions, ie Mars. Given the potential rewards, seems like a very worthwhile risk.
Isn't the drone ship video problem on the "ground" side? That is, the vibrations and motions the rocket induces ends up messing up the satellite dish's targeting.
Is there any information out there about what the terrestrial requirements to actually use this service are going to be? Is it going to require antennas similar to line-of-sight microwave internet providers like Monkeybrains? How much is that hardware expected to cost?
The satellites themselves, the way they're being deployed, what altitude they'll be in orbit...all of that is really fascinating, but I'm very curious what this is actually going to look like to use.
Am I missing something? I feel like this website has no actual information on it. It's just pretty pictures and a bit text that doesn't talk about anything new.
Does anyone know what that pulsing visible in the mylar of the second stage was? I've watched several SpaceX launches, and never noticed such a long-period (about a second) repeating 'thump' before.
I wish they offered sensible guaranteed minimum bandwidth and didn't oversubscribe their links too much and included good QOS/traffic shaping with maybe prioritizing game traffic (or udp) for lower latency gaming.
I'd be more than happy getting say a guaranteed 5 MB/s (~50 mbps) steady with super low latency on the cheap everywhere on the earth. I'm currently getting about 1-2 MB/s on 4G mobile internets for ~25 eur a month but at least it's _real_ unlimited.
In Ireland we've just agreed a 5 billion euro rural broadband scheme which will involve laying fibre that goes to 540,000 rural homes. 3 Billion is the cost to the state, 2 Billion is the private investment and the private company will own the infrastructure after (I think) 20 years or so. The whole thing is going take several years to become functional and I think 7 years to be fully functional.
So my question is: how likely is it that something like Starlink could provide an alternative in any meaningful timeframe?
Considering that the market for this product is people with subpar internet connections, it might be worth considering building a website that doesn't require nice hardware and a fast, stable internet connection to accurately load the page :)
Have they said how traffic will be routed? If I'm in, say, the US, and I'm connecting to a web site in Australia, would the satellite I'm connected to send my traffic to a terrestrial router near me, and let it traverse from there via regular ground links to Australia? Or would my traffic travel via satellite to a terrestrial router near the destination?
Not only is this technological amazing, hopefully it will provide competition to areas with monopolistic ISPs. More choices, lower prices, faster speeds!
Apart from the launch method - how is this going to be different from existing VSAT deployments? They're quite expensive (starting from ~thousand dollars per month):
So, technically what do you need to use their offering down the road? A satellite dish on the roof? Just a small antenna as built in in most phones today?
[+] [-] stupidcar|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] jdietrich|6 years ago|reply
In the developing world, we've seen a leapfrog effect in telecoms - they skipped over fixed-line phones and went straight to mobile phones. It's far easier to blanket a rural area or a dense slum with 3G signal than to run wires to every house.
That poses a problem when you need fast fixed broadband - there's only so much mobile spectrum to go around, you can't really cheat the Shannon-Hartley theorem, so you end up with tight data caps and unreliable performance. Rolling out fixed infrastructure can be prohibitively expensive, so a lot of areas are stuck on mobile-only.
Low-orbit satellite broadband potentially breaks this dilemma. The low orbit provides tolerable latency (within 30ms of fixed broadband), there's an abundance of spectrum in the Ku and Ka bands and you can steer a tight beam with a phased array. Starlink and OneWeb could potentially offer a satellite broadband product that is competitive with fixed-line broadband on cost, latency and bandwidth, but that is available almost anywhere on earth. Becoming the default broadband provider for half the world's population is Kind Of A Big Deal - maybe enough of a big deal to bankroll a Mars mission.
I think there's obvious potential for this to be Kind Of A Big Deal on a purely personal level. Is your local cable monopoly absolutely terrible? Within a couple of years, it might not be a monopoly any more. Huge amounts of rural real estate becomes a heck of a lot more attractive if literally everywhere has good broadband. This might just be one of those once-in-a-generation technologies that meaningfully changes human geography.
[+] [-] martythemaniak|6 years ago|reply
The cars will use LTE, although the backbone of those base stations could very well be Starlink.
Maybe future iterations will have extra hardware for terminal friendly applications, but I'd guess you'll see level 4 autonomy in a model 3 before they can upgrade Stsrlink to do that.
[+] [-] ec109685|6 years ago|reply
Never have needed a faster Internet in a Tesla and all passengers will be carrying their phones anyway.
[+] [-] sdan|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] stcredzero|6 years ago|reply
Assuming Starlink also works, I suspect the first company to make this work would make an absolute killing.
[+] [-] DeonPenny|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] indolering|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] devoply|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] crakenzak|6 years ago|reply
Will definitely be getting service for some family members in Northern Africa where incredibly slow speeds are charged high prices if Starlink can compete on price.
[+] [-] NotSammyHagar|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] Simple_Guy|6 years ago|reply
this is compulsory anyway due to physics.
[+] [-] programmarchy|6 years ago|reply
> autonomously perform maneuvers to avoid collisions with space debris and other spacecraft
Pretty cool.
Also, the north and south pole are conspicuously avoided by Starlink, confirming my suspicions about the locations of intergalactic space ports.
[+] [-] M4v3R|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] siquick|6 years ago|reply
Are you saying that there will be intergalactic space ports at the poles in the future?
[+] [-] elamje|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] tomp|6 years ago|reply
> Starlink is the first krypton propelled spacecraft ever flown.
So they're using non-flight-proven technology (Technology readiness level at most 6)... impressive!
[+] [-] shmerl|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] downrightmike|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] sidcool|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] unknown|6 years ago|reply
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[+] [-] SEJeff|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] faitswulff|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] ttflee|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] TimTheTinker|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] joshlegs|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] hairytrog|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] cocoggu|6 years ago|reply
As a foreigner living in China, I'm wondering if such network can be technically prevented from being used in covered land/countries? How cool would it be to finally get an unrestricted access to the Internet here.
But I'm probably just dreaming.
[+] [-] diggan|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] jacobwilliamroy|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] gauravphoenix|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] ChuckMcM|6 years ago|reply
One of my managers from Sun, Don Hoffman, left and went on as an early employee of Teledesic, a LEO satellite broadband company in 1990 :-). But the prohibitive cost to get to space, and the size of their satellites, ultimately doomed them.
Starlink is a good example of an idea that failed but could succeed now because technology has moved far enough forward to actually do what the engineers envisioned in a more cost effective way.
That said, its a risky move for SpaceX which has the potential to be considered as having a launch monopoly given their costs structure, and using that to get into adjacent markets is something that is the kind of thing that antitrust lawyers go after.
[+] [-] martythemaniak|6 years ago|reply
This is the only thing that would allow SpaceX to have non-linear growth and ultimately fund their grander ambitions, ie Mars. Given the potential rewards, seems like a very worthwhile risk.
[+] [-] 3JPLW|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] mmcclure|6 years ago|reply
The satellites themselves, the way they're being deployed, what altitude they'll be in orbit...all of that is really fascinating, but I'm very curious what this is actually going to look like to use.
[+] [-] skunkworker|6 years ago|reply
This could have a huge impact on people wanting to live out of a van remotely and still be connected.
[+] [-] chipperyman573|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] Baeocystin|6 years ago|reply
https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=504&v=riBaVeDTEW... is when you can first see it. It's visible in the top view looking at the satellites as well.
[+] [-] brianwawok|6 years ago|reply
Is it a $8000 base station + $200 a month for a 1 GB capped connection?
Or a $500 base station + $50 a month for 1 TB of bandwidth?
I hope for the latter but fear the former.
[+] [-] nugga|6 years ago|reply
I'd be more than happy getting say a guaranteed 5 MB/s (~50 mbps) steady with super low latency on the cheap everywhere on the earth. I'm currently getting about 1-2 MB/s on 4G mobile internets for ~25 eur a month but at least it's _real_ unlimited.
[+] [-] ghobs91|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] scandox|6 years ago|reply
So my question is: how likely is it that something like Starlink could provide an alternative in any meaningful timeframe?
[+] [-] porkloin|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] gr2020|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] abootstrapper|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] YjSe2GMQ|6 years ago|reply
http://www.melatnetworks.com/price-list.asp
Or those, with prices around 50usd/gb:
https://www.vsat-systems.com/service-offerings/VAR-VNO-Deale...
I doubt every Tesla will have one on board. LTE is so much cheaper.
Quite useful for medium and large marine vessels, or truly remote locations tho.
[+] [-] skunkworker|6 years ago|reply
22,236 in Lightseconds: 0.11936716 (one way) 400 in Ls: 0.0021472775.
(assuming directly overhead)
~250ms round trip for GEO vs 4.2ms for LEO
[+] [-] foota|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] pergadad|6 years ago|reply
And where do I sign up? :-)
[+] [-] jerkstate|6 years ago|reply