Starlink satellite internet

My At&t dsl, while slow, has been reliable for the past few years. A couple weeks ago, it has been dropping out for hours almost every night. After all troubleshooting on my end, I finally had to call them. They sent a tech out and said everything is working fine, all lines look good, but he is seeing a lot of line errors causing modem reboots. He said that since I am 6100 feet from the nearest central office (in town), my lines are unable to sustain the 18down/1up package that I have, and the modem keeps rebooting and trying to achieve those speeds. It does not make sense since its been reliable for years (even though I only get about 12 down, 1 up most of the time), nothing has changed, and my new problems are happening overnight at off peak times. After talking with customer service, they are sending out a line tech to test/measure the lines from the central office to my box out front. Doubtful they will find anything.

Yeah, I need Starlink to work out.
 
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bp2008 said:
How do these people get to be tech journalists?
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They write articles and shop them around. Whomever takes it pays them a pittance. Nothing is ever edited by the publisher, not even screened for accuracy or truth. Most 'news' agencies these days have very little staff and no editors. They just pump out crap and don't give two hoots as long as people keep clicking to drive up the ad revenue.
 
Jessie.slimer said:
My At&t dsl, while slow, has been reliable for the past few years. A couple weeks ago, it has been dropping out for hours almost every night. After all troubleshooting on my end, I finally had to call them. They sent a tech out and said everything is working fine, all lines look good, but he is seeing a lot of line errors causing modem reboots. He said that since I am 6100 feet from the nearest central office (in town), my lines are unable to sustain the 18down/1up package that I have, and the modem keeps rebooting and trying to achieve those speeds. It does not make sense since its been reliable for years (even though I only get about 12 down, 1 up most of the time), nothing has changed, and my new problems are happening overnight at off peak times. After talking with customer service, they are sending out a line tech to test/measure the lines from the central office to my box out front. Doubtful they will find anything.

Yeah, I need Starlink to work out.
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A connection on a pole somewhere that recently got wet.
My dad's had that experience multiple times with his. AT&T's infrastructure in his area is probably 40 yrs old.
 
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looney2ns said:
A connection on a pole somewhere that recently got wet.
My dad's had that experience multiple times with his. AT&T's infrastructure in his area is probably 40 yrs old.
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Come to think of it, we did have that derecho come through here a couple weeks ago. High winds and lots of rain. We hit 85mph. Damn, I did not think of that. The issue did start about that time. Thanks.

Maybe they will find something on that line.
 
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Jessie.slimer said:
Come to think of it, we did have that derecho come through here a couple weeks ago. High winds and lots of rain. We hit 85mph. Damn, I did not think of that. The issue did start about that time. Thanks.

Maybe they will find something on that line.
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Hopefully you get a lineman that has a clue what he's doing. :smash:
 
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bp2008 said:
...I would happily subscribe to Starlink even though all the snow in my area would likely make it unreliable in winter. It would at least be a backup connection....
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Is it snow in the air that mucks it up, or accumulation on the receiver antenna?
 
Uhhh, both? :rofl:
 
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The frequency they operate at, UHF, also gets attenuated easily by just about any kind of obstruction. In all fairness, I used Dish for a while here in NJ and only had dropouts during thunder storms from lightening ionizing the atmosphere for a few seconds at a time. Overall, it's actually pretty reliable unles you're somewhere prone to lots of heavy snow.
 
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sdkid said:
Is it snow in the air that mucks it up, or accumulation on the receiver antenna?
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Using DirecTV for many years, the only major signal issues were when snow accumulated on the dish. There were occasional hiccups otherwise, but we usually watched recorded stuff and had no idea what the weather was like when that was being recorded.
 
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manic5oul said:
Starlink is having a beta test for the northern U.S. and southern Canada, between 44 and 52 degrees latitude. There is a Reddit r/Starlink with more details. HERE
Also, check the Starlink website and sign up for access. HERE
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Damn, I am 2 degrees off. Probably why they never contacted me, since I signed up a while ago. Thanks for the link though. Some good info in there.
 
Jessie.slimer said:
Come to think of it, we did have that derecho come through here a couple weeks ago. High winds and lots of rain. We hit 85mph. Damn, I did not think of that. The issue did start about that time. Thanks.

Maybe they will find something on that line.
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They still have not come out to test the lines, but I had no internet last night, so I called them so they could do their remote testing while the problem is happening. They ran a 900 second modem test (not sure what they were looking at), but they said the modem failed. It showed it was uploading and downloading, but not passing anything through to my LAN. I couldn't even log onto it's IP to look at settings or data. New one arriving tomorrow. They are sending an NVG599 instead of the Pace 5268ac that I have now. Fingers crossed.
 
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early star link satellites are linking back to ground boxes right now. Extra hopping up and then back down, satellite to satellite is in its infancy with few satellites up in the air.
This will dramatically improve, probably next summer, a lot better speeds will be seen. I'm looking forward to it, but I live in fla so it will be a while.
I refuse to do business with comcast, so I have to deal with an at&t copper line, but I went with an out of state isp, so I dont have to deal with any of at&t rules.
I hope there are no caps of any kind. we'll see... rates are 80.00 I believe.. may get cheaper.. this will help fund spacex tremendously. waiting for i.p.o offer ???
 
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What are the speeds like with Starlink Satellite Internet?
 
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