3 ms·

$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

$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.
        n8henrie 4y ago
        Small house, single TV. Yes, I pause / throttle high bandwidth activities when we're going to stream something as a family. You're probably right though.

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.
      - n8henrie 4y ago
        Small house, single TV. Yes, I pause / throttle high bandwidth activities when we're going to stream something as a family. You're probably right though.