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It went up only 10$ per month in congested areas, and went down by 20$ in uncongested areas. It's still 90$ if you are rural. They are trying to encourage agai

It went up only 10$ per month in congested areas, and went down by 20$ in uncongested areas. It's still 90$ if you are rural. They are trying to encourage against people using the service in urban congested areas. Starlink, at least right now, is not ideal for urban situations, that's not very surprising, maybe with newer gen sats capacity will raise, but if not, it's not an "unreliable luxury", it's still perfect for rural situations.

n8henrie 4y ago
$90 if you're rural?! I'm now going to be paying $120. I live in a small town on the Navajo reservation. We don't have postal service, many here don't even have running water or electricity. The alternative ISP is 6 mbps max. Any idea how I apply for this rural pricing?
- eganist 4y ago
  Not sure where they got that figure; I just spot-checked a few rural homes in reservations and got back the same 120 figure you did. Fingers crossed something exists for you though.
  - zamadatix 4y ago
    The figure comes from TFA. The criteria being "rural areas" in unsourced though as all Starlink reported was areas with "excess capacity". I was able to get 90$/m using an address North Dakota 58647 but not a random address in the middle of nowhere Wyoming. This leads me to think the user capacity in the 24km cell isn't the only factor as the North Dakota address was certainly less rural than the Wyoming one I picked (and both instantly available). If I had to guess I'd say you do have to be rural enough your user cell isn't near capacity but not in a region where there are a limited number of ground stations for the satellites to connect back to. For the Navajo region there are no ground stations in NM, one in AZ but in the opposite corner of the state, one in NV, one on the opposite end of UT, and one in the opposite end of CO. For Wyoming the story is almost identical. For ND there are 3 ground stations in the state.
- yazaddaruvala 4y ago
  Do you know if the issue of congestion is bandwidth, or if its bound by satellite to ground connections? If its the latter, have you tried finding a neighbor or two and paying $60 each or $40 each?
  - n8henrie 4y ago
    Not sure I understand your question. Both speed and usage would be an issue; I average ~70 mbps during the day but drop to ~40 overnight, not much to share before I'm close to our ISP's 6 (which was about half the price, no caps). I'm also at about 80% of the usage cap.
    - yazaddaruvala 4y ago
      It’s very unlikely you have 70mbps sustained usage. Typically it’s an average of peak per X mins. You likely could save money by sharing your Starlink with a neighbor and neither of you would have much noticeable impact to bandwidth. Your latency might get slightly worse because of possible “noisy neighbor” but gotta ask if that latency is worth the extra $.
      - n8henrie 4y ago
        No, I meant that's the average speed I get (so if we were splitting it I assume our speeds would each be half that when downloading / streaming simultaneously).
        yazaddaruvala 4y ago
        Yes technically, but I think you're unlikely to notice it in practice. In the worst case, because of buffering, your Netflix video might take an extra 10 seconds to start and then you'd notice no interruptions (unless you're skipping back and forth). But even that worst case would be unlikely to really be an issue. For example, are you ever interrupted by someone else in your household turning on another TV? It would be similar. You wouldn't want to share with your neighbor if they are actively abusing this with torrents or some other constant high bandwidth activity, but ideally you'd pick a neighbor you already know well and can trust.
20after4 4y ago
Where I live (Very rural part of southern Missouri) the service is oversold and very expensive. I was on the waiting list for 2 years and then they offered "RV" service at a best effort service level. The service was fast and reliable enough but I canceled when they raised the rate to $170 per month.
mike_d 4y ago
> It's still 90$ if you are rural. Rural areas are the only place there is demand for Starlink. Nobody buys 95% reliable internet in a city that has fiber.
londons_explore 4y ago
Which seems like crazy pricing... They should have simply released a "premium speed" upgrade for $50, which boosts your speeds and reliability for a while. In congested areas, with heavy use, it might last only a few days. In rural areas it might last months. Then have a checkbox to auto-renew the premium speed when it runs out. And say on the purchase page "Given your location and recent usage, we expect the premium speed boost will last about X hours/days/months".
- londons_explore 4y ago
  Another approach is to say "A subscription is $100/month. But, if you like, you can buy another subscription, and then you'll get double the speed." And as the network gets more congested, then speeds drop, and more and more people are pushed to buying the double speed upgrade, and eventually the triple speed upgrade, etc. This approach is effectively a real time market for bandwidth in disguise.

n8henrie 4y ago

$90 if you're rural?! I'm now going to be paying $120. I live in a small town on the Navajo reservation. We don't have postal service, many here don't even have running water or electricity. The alternative ISP is 6 mbps max. Any idea how I apply for this rural pricing?

eganist 4y ago
Not sure where they got that figure; I just spot-checked a few rural homes in reservations and got back the same 120 figure you did. Fingers crossed something exists for you though.
- zamadatix 4y ago
  The figure comes from TFA. The criteria being "rural areas" in unsourced though as all Starlink reported was areas with "excess capacity". I was able to get 90$/m using an address North Dakota 58647 but not a random address in the middle of nowhere Wyoming. This leads me to think the user capacity in the 24km cell isn't the only factor as the North Dakota address was certainly less rural than the Wyoming one I picked (and both instantly available). If I had to guess I'd say you do have to be rural enough your user cell isn't near capacity but not in a region where there are a limited number of ground stations for the satellites to connect back to. For the Navajo region there are no ground stations in NM, one in AZ but in the opposite corner of the state, one in NV, one on the opposite end of UT, and one in the opposite end of CO. For Wyoming the story is almost identical. For ND there are 3 ground stations in the state.
yazaddaruvala 4y ago
Do you know if the issue of congestion is bandwidth, or if its bound by satellite to ground connections? If its the latter, have you tried finding a neighbor or two and paying $60 each or $40 each?
- n8henrie 4y ago
  Not sure I understand your question. Both speed and usage would be an issue; I average ~70 mbps during the day but drop to ~40 overnight, not much to share before I'm close to our ISP's 6 (which was about half the price, no caps). I'm also at about 80% of the usage cap.
  - yazaddaruvala 4y ago
    It’s very unlikely you have 70mbps sustained usage. Typically it’s an average of peak per X mins. You likely could save money by sharing your Starlink with a neighbor and neither of you would have much noticeable impact to bandwidth. Your latency might get slightly worse because of possible “noisy neighbor” but gotta ask if that latency is worth the extra $.
    - n8henrie 4y ago
      No, I meant that's the average speed I get (so if we were splitting it I assume our speeds would each be half that when downloading / streaming simultaneously).
      - yazaddaruvala 4y ago
        Yes technically, but I think you're unlikely to notice it in practice. In the worst case, because of buffering, your Netflix video might take an extra 10 seconds to start and then you'd notice no interruptions (unless you're skipping back and forth). But even that worst case would be unlikely to really be an issue. For example, are you ever interrupted by someone else in your household turning on another TV? It would be similar. You wouldn't want to share with your neighbor if they are actively abusing this with torrents or some other constant high bandwidth activity, but ideally you'd pick a neighbor you already know well and can trust.

20after4 4y ago

Where I live (Very rural part of southern Missouri) the service is oversold and very expensive. I was on the waiting list for 2 years and then they offered "RV" service at a best effort service level. The service was fast and reliable enough but I canceled when they raised the rate to $170 per month.

mike_d 4y ago

> It's still 90$ if you are rural. Rural areas are the only place there is demand for Starlink. Nobody buys 95% reliable internet in a city that has fiber.

londons_explore 4y ago

Which seems like crazy pricing... They should have simply released a "premium speed" upgrade for $50, which boosts your speeds and reliability for a while. In congested areas, with heavy use, it might last only a few days. In rural areas it might last months. Then have a checkbox to auto-renew the premium speed when it runs out. And say on the purchase page "Given your location and recent usage, we expect the premium speed boost will last about X hours/days/months".

londons_explore 4y ago
Another approach is to say "A subscription is $100/month. But, if you like, you can buy another subscription, and then you'll get double the speed." And as the network gets more congested, then speeds drop, and more and more people are pushed to buying the double speed upgrade, and eventually the triple speed upgrade, etc. This approach is effectively a real time market for bandwidth in disguise.