3 ms·

Yeah I'm struggling to get too excited here. Theoretically latency with current geostationary satellites "could be as low as" 477ms, but they're usually 600ms+.

• ccffpphh 6y ago
  To be fair, geostationary orbit is 36000km, whereas Starlink is at 550km. Geo hits, yes, roughly 400ms under perfect conditions whereas 550km would be expected to hit 9ms.
• toufka 6y ago
  These are _not_ geostationary orbits. Starlink's network is of a fast/low/hand-off variety rather than a high/stationary/single-satellite->communications variety. Their satellites are MUCH closer and are constantly whizzing across the horizon (and so require a motorized antenna) than the transitional geostationary communications satellites. This would require a huge number of satellites to get full-sky-coverage, but that's exactly what Starlink is doing. 1) Speed of light in space is faster than speed of light in a fiber optic cable... 2) And the number of hops in the void of space could be MANY fewer than from city to city to ocean to city.
  • RealityVoid 6y ago
    I'm pretty sure the antenna is not motorized but is a phased array instead.
    • toufka 6y ago
      Looks like both? (I'm not qualified to really assess...) https://www.reddit.com/r/Starlink/comments/gr284b/satellite_tracking/ https://www.reddit.com/r/Starlink/comments/gr284b/satellite_... https://www.microwaves101.com/encyclopedias/phased-array-antennas https://www.microwaves101.com/encyclopedias/phased-array-ant...
      • RealityVoid 6y ago
        Neither am I, honestly, maybe I phrased it too strongly. Pretty sure = I think I read it somewhere and it makes sense. Regardless, hybrid makes a lot of sense! TIL!