4 ms·

For those without available wired broadband options, the price point is a no-brainer. In rural areas, your only option is often cellular (3G/4G) "hotspots" and

For those without available wired broadband options, the price point is a no-brainer. In rural areas, your only option is often cellular (3G/4G) "hotspots" and the monthly cost will be outrageous unless you can convince everyone in your house to stay off of Netflix, etc. If you're in a rural area and you want Internet access for streaming video or your kids who are in school or just don't want to have to deal with or worry about data caps (with outrageous overage fees!), this is quite likely your best ption. The $100 monthly cost isn't unreasonable. You're going to be paying probably $60-70 for spotty cellular service with a data cap and/or throttling anyways, so might as well pay the little bit extra and not have to worry about it. The one-time $500 setup/equipment fee will be harder to justify. I expect Starlink will offer an option to spread that out over a year or two which would make it much easier for some households.

samcheng 6y ago
Cable companies (notoriously) bundle-in an equipment rental fee, which makes many times the equipment cost over the lifetime of the customer. I'd assume they will move to that model in the long term. Probably the $500 fee is a way to ensure dedicated / "bought-in" beta customers.
- entropicdrifter 6y ago
  On the flipside, cable companies are legally required to allow you to buy your own modem if you so choose, so if you're willing to drop $50-$200 on a good modem it'll pay for itself within a year and you can minimize the amount of data snooping your ISP can do. That said, only techies seem to bother with that even though it's generally worth it for the power efficiency alone, let alone the equipment rental costs
  - olyjohn 6y ago
    I’ve always just picked them up used. Never paid more than $10 for a cable modem. I even keep a spare around in case my first one blows up. So many people have these things sitting around from changing providers or moving.
- Thetawaves 6y ago
  I don't think that is a universal rule - that equipment fees make back many times the cost of the device. A high end DVR may cost close to 1000$ and a 20$/month equipment fee will barely break even over the life of the device...
  - NeutronStar 6y ago
    A high end DVR might, the shitty DVR they'll loan you will.
deleted 6y ago
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samcheng 6y ago

Cable companies (notoriously) bundle-in an equipment rental fee, which makes many times the equipment cost over the lifetime of the customer. I'd assume they will move to that model in the long term. Probably the $500 fee is a way to ensure dedicated / "bought-in" beta customers.

entropicdrifter 6y ago
On the flipside, cable companies are legally required to allow you to buy your own modem if you so choose, so if you're willing to drop $50-$200 on a good modem it'll pay for itself within a year and you can minimize the amount of data snooping your ISP can do. That said, only techies seem to bother with that even though it's generally worth it for the power efficiency alone, let alone the equipment rental costs
- olyjohn 6y ago
  I’ve always just picked them up used. Never paid more than $10 for a cable modem. I even keep a spare around in case my first one blows up. So many people have these things sitting around from changing providers or moving.
Thetawaves 6y ago
I don't think that is a universal rule - that equipment fees make back many times the cost of the device. A high end DVR may cost close to 1000$ and a 20$/month equipment fee will barely break even over the life of the device...
- NeutronStar 6y ago
  A high end DVR might, the shitty DVR they'll loan you will.

deleted 6y ago

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