14 ms·

Roam 50GB is now Roam 100GB

295 points by bahmboo 9mo ago

bahmboo 9mo ago
Nice that instead of completely cutting you off at the cap they put it in super slow 500 kbits. That is actually usable and used to be the fastest speed you could get at home.
- vidarh 9mo ago
  My first company was an ISP, and our selling point was that we had higher bandwith out of Norway than any competitors in our price range.... A whopping 512kps.
  - reactordev 9mo ago
    Mmmmm ISDN copper…
    - barbazoo 9mo ago
      If I remember right we could get 64kb/s or 128kb/s if you bundled them, that was in Germany. But also, we didn't have that, we only had a 56kb/s modem and I remember really wanting ISDN when I was a kid :)
      - vardump 9mo ago
        ISDN (IDSL) was max 144 kbit/s. Two 64 kbit/s channels and one 16 kbit/s control channel all bundled together.
        reactordev 9mo ago
        Or four bonded twin-64kbit channels with a multiplexer. Ahhh, high school…
    - vidarh 9mo ago
      Copper, but not ISDN. Fractional E1 leased line. There were expensive and limited ISDN connections available in Norway at the time ('95), but not cost effective for an ISP.
      - reactordev 9mo ago
        I was in Northern Virginia at the time enjoying this new thing called AOL.
  - AdamJacobMuller 9mo ago
    I remember being amazingly excited to have saved up enough money to go to the store and buy a 33.6 modem (an amazing upgrade from my 14.4). A year or so later I upgraded to a v.92 only to realize my ISP (I think it was IDT at the time) didn't support that and only supported some other 56k "standard" (details are sketchy on this, I was like 12). I was devastated and it was too late to drive back to computer city to exchange it for the correct one. Now I have 10G symmetric in my house.
- jcims 9mo ago
  Still with pretty low latency (25-35ms) as well (similar to the Standby (aka pause) state you can put the account into for $5/mo)
  - rootusrootus 9mo ago
    The standby account -is- 500 kbps, probably it's the same mode, so I'd expect the same performance. Anecdotally, even though I'd have told you that 500 was probably enough for non-streaming stuff that I do most of the time, in my experience when my connection switches over to Starlink (I have Comcast primarily, but it has had reliability problems the last few months), it usually hits the Starlink limits pretty hard. I've never identified any nefarious activity, it just seems like all the little things on my workstations and various devices that chatter add up to enough to trigger Starlink's controls.
- SkyPuncher 9mo ago
  That's faster than my cell phone in the areas where I desperately need Starlink....500kb > 0
  - TN1ck 9mo ago
    Be aware that it is bits, so 62.5kb. But I agree, the internet is still usable with that.
    - mlyle 9mo ago
      People always use bits for connectivity. 62.5kB/sec -- maybe really 55-60kB/sec downloaded. Or 18 seconds to get a megabyte. This is simultaneously fast (on my 14400 bps modem that I spent the most time "waiting for downloading", I was used to 12-13 minutes per megabyte vs. 18 seconds here) and slow (the google homepage is >1MB, so until you have resources cached you're waiting tens of seconds). It would be nice if everything were just a touch more efficient.
      - volemo 9mo ago
        Is Google homepage consisting of a text input field and like ten buttons really over a megabyte? Damn.
        mlyle 9mo ago
        I end up transferring 940kB (with a lot of blocking cranked up). Typing "hello" in the search bar takes it up to 1MB. Then the first page of search results is another 1.3MB. Now, I assume all of this would start working before it's all transferred. But we're still talking about tens of seconds of transfer at 500kbit/sec. (And Google at least acts like they care about bandwidth a little. So many 15megabyte pages out there...)
    - namanyayg 9mo ago
      I've never heard bandwidth being expressed in bytes. But if we're being pedantic then I'd like to throw my hat in and call it 62.5kB. Or even better, 62.5KiB (for kibibyte)
- mikestew 9mo ago
  No, not nice. Previously, if we exceeded the 50Gb cap, there was the option to continue on at high-speed for $1/Gb. And that's the same price per Gb as the base plan of 50Gb/month for $50. Now, it's either upgrade to unlimited, or enjoy Netflix at 500Kbps. I want the old plan back.
  - scottyah 9mo ago
    Now the cap is 100G. Seems like an odd complaint. Did you often exceed 100Gb?
    - mikestew 9mo ago
      It's unlikely that we will exceed 100Gb/month in the camper. But if we do, it's either slow speeds, or pay $165/month for unlimited roam every single month we use it, versus paying a little extra for the few times we go over. In the end, it'll probably work out okay for us, but I liked the previous option of being able to get high-speed data at a reasonable price should we go over the limit.
      - natch 9mo ago
        Fortunately 1. For slow speeds, it’s not like you have to live with that slowness every day. The impact is limited to the remaining few days of the month where you ran up against the 100GB, so the either-or in your statement looks worse than it is; and 2. Starlink makes it dead easy to switch from plan to plan right in the app so you can go right back to a lower plan when the higher one is not needed. With the caveat that they do change what plans are available sometimes as we’re seeing here.
  - ralfd 9mo ago
    If I calculate correctly then 500 kbps is actually enough for Netflix in standard quality. If one wants to binge watch 4K (7 GB per hour) then the unlimited plan makes more sense anyway.
  - lukevp 9mo ago
    Wait, the price didn’t change though did it? So you get 100 gigs for the price of 50 before?
- sib 9mo ago
  The first modem that I owned was 1200 baud. The first one that I used was 110 and it was exciting when it was upgraded to 300. It took ~20 years from when I first got online until my home internet reached 512kbps.
  - hinkley 9mo ago
    I bought a cheap 1200 and then once I had use for it I saved up for a USR 14.4 with a shiny extruded aluminum case. At one point I was sharing that with two roommates using SLIP and surplussed Cisco coaxial NICs.
- doublerabbit 9mo ago
  Good enough to play Quake 3 Arena.
- Sammi 9mo ago
  You might just be able to stream 240p youtube without stuttering with that.
- danpalmer 9mo ago
  I'd disagree that that is usable today. A few days ago I had some network trouble that restricted me to about 350kbps, although stable without much packet loss, and a lot of stuff just didn't practically work. At that speed, loading images and resources on webpages within timeout limits is hard. Many web apps don't work, or degrade enough that you wouldn't want to use them. Also what do we actually use the web for? A lot of streaming video and audio that won't work. A lot of reading webpages with a lot of images and ads, that won't work. I'm sure that Wikipedia would load and work slowly, but that's not really representative of web usage today. There's a separate argument about whether the web should be like that, but regardless of your thoughts on that, it is like that.
  - digiown 9mo ago
    I hope we get LLM browser agents that will convert the web back to that state again. You can get sorta close now with adblockers, various "lite" modes, and unofficial client sites, but it would be nice if it were universal.
    - danpalmer 9mo ago
      This is a separate discussion, but while I agree in general that pages should be less bloated than they are, ads shouldn't burn my CPU, etc, I think it's a sign of progress that the web takes much more bandwidth. 4K video is better than HD, is better than SD, is better than no video. Illustrations improve articles. More client side Javascript tends to mean more interactivity which is often a good thing (not always). The web today does so much more than it did 20 years ago, and we should be proud of that achievement rather than push back on progress by expecting the web to work on a connection from 20 years ago.
  - olyjohn 9mo ago
    Set your device to "metered network" and all the background shit will stop running. That's what I had to do to get my Starlink mini working in Standby mode. As soon as your device is on WiFi it thinks it's a free for all and starts updating and downloading shit in the background. The 500KB/sec is more than enough as long as that isn't happening.
- gramie 9mo ago
  > used to be the fastest speed you could get at home My 1200 baud from 1987 would beg to differ. Granted, that was for bulletin boards, not the WWW (which hadn't been invented yet).
deleted 9mo ago
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Aurornis 9mo ago
That's not bad for the cheap plan. Even the slow mode is fast enough for video conferencing and doing basic remote work. They still have a separate unlimited plan for anyone who needs more.
- Neywiny 9mo ago
  They explicitly say video streaming will be "limited" aka it won't work like you want it to
  - bahmboo 9mo ago
    I haven't done a video call on it but it does work for youtube. It's best to pause a video at the start but it buffers and plays just fine. Blocky but certainly watchable.
  - mattmaroon 9mo ago
    If the data speed is sufficient but they’re intentionally throttling video you could maybe get around it a VPN.
  - Aurornis 9mo ago
    Zoom works in 500kbps environments in my experience. You won't be in crispy 720p or 1080p, but you can still talk to other people.
    - olyjohn 9mo ago
      I had a shitty DSL line just a couple years ago before Starlink. Maybe 700KBps if I was lucky. Both me and my partner could remotely work on it, run zoom calls at the same time. That said, it is nice to have more bandwidth, but people do vastly overestimate how much they really need.
    - userbinator 9mo ago
      but you can still talk to other people As should be the case, as GSM half-rate works at 5.6kbps (700 bytes per second) and gives intelligible speech.
renewiltord 9mo ago
I’ve kept it on the backup service for 10 GB at $10 or whatever and it’s pretty cool. Used it off my balcony in SF when Google Fiber had a 1 hr outage, take it on road trips, and stuff like that. Totally worth it.
deleted 9mo ago
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Someone1234 9mo ago
I'm actually a huge fan of "unlimited slow speeds" as a falloff, instead of a cliff. Aside from the fact it allows you to work with Starlink to buy more fast speed, it also allows core stuff to continue to function (e.g. basic notifications, non-streaming web traffic, etc).
- frognumber 9mo ago
  Years ago, I picked cell carrier because of this. When I ran out, it switched to O(200kbps), which is fine for email, basic web search, etc. It was actually a bit ironic that, at the time, you could burn through the whole high-speed quota in seconds or minutes, if you went to the wrong web page. Most carriers would stop or bill you an arm-and-a-leg after.
  - kotaKat 9mo ago
    5G data roaming is hilarious for this. Verizon offered 500MB of high speed data roaming per day in Canada before throttling down to ~128kbps. I ran one single speedtest in the middle of Ottawa on Rogers 5G, didn't even finish the speedtest (hitting an error at the end that it failed), and got the text message going "You've run out of high speed data today. Do you want to buy another 500MB for $5?" At least it's 2GB/day now. And my 5G roaming is off...
    - londons_explore 9mo ago
      Roaming in some countries is like $10,000/gigabyte... At that price, I dunno why they offer it at all. Are they just hoping to sue someone to get their whole house because they once watched some netflix overseas and forgot to use wifi?
      - kalleboo 9mo ago
        They were deals that were made back in the WAP days where spending $1 a few times a day to check your business email made some semblance of sense, that then got neglected.
PaulDavisThe1st 9mo ago
They could make it 1000GB for US$10/month and I still wouldn't give any money to a company associated with that man.
- wtfHN26 9mo ago
  That's such an unique viewpoint that no one has expressed on the internet. Thank you for bringing value to this comments section.
  - PaulDavisThe1st 9mo ago
    I was hoping to bring my karma down a bit.
  - deleted 9mo ago
    [deleted]
  - buellerbueller 9mo ago
    Et tu, wtfHN26.
  - afavour 9mo ago
    I'm surprised that you signed up for an account just to say something this empty
    - IncreasePosts 9mo ago
      Just FYI you accidentally replied to wtfHN26 instead of PaulDavisThe1st
    - MosuraGinniren 9mo ago
      [dead]
- selectively 9mo ago
  You are good.
behnamoh 9mo ago
Finally I can use Codex/OpenCode even out in the woods. No work-life balance; just vibing everywhere I go.
- scottyah 9mo ago
  Haha vibe coding is pretty addictive. Maybe vibe code an app that tells you how to improve work life balance in the woods ;) Youtubing how to deal with a snakebite might come in more handy.
- olyjohn 9mo ago
  [delayed]
gregsadetsky 9mo ago
I had a “hit” post on bsky [0] (90 likes, big numbers for me) asking whether people would want an unlimited mobile plan throttled at 256kbps for $2/month. Seems like yes? There’s lots to say about how useable it is (I often get throttled when traveling and it’s really not that bad + it helps curb any desire to scroll videos!) But mainly I want to ask - I looked into it for a minute and it seems like you couldn’t start an mvno because carriers wouldn’t let you cannibalize them? You can get very cheap IoT plans but if you tried reselling IoT as esims for consumers, the carriers would kill it? So yeah - Starlink to mobile is actually the only viable way that routes around this problem? (((email in profile if you’re cuckoo enough like me and want to start a self service’d throttled mvno))) [0] https://bsky.app/profile/greg.technology/post/3mbmwsytnyc23 https://bsky.app/profile/greg.technology/post/3mbmwsytnyc23
- CyberDildonics 9mo ago
  This doesn't seem to have anything to do with the current advertisement being discussed.
  - gregsadetsky 9mo ago
    Sorry yes - I think it does. Starlink sats can already offer 5G service directly to mobile phones (from the sky!!) And there are other comments here talking about this specifically - how unlimited bandwidth throttled plans are actually useful and would be great to have.
- 1234letshaveatw 9mo ago
  Not just you, that might be a overall record for bsky?
- anewhnaccount2 9mo ago
  There is something like this but twice the prive in Finland https://www.moi.fi/laitenetti https://www.moi.fi/laitenetti . Can't make outgoing calls but there are pay as you internet call out services for that occaddional use case.
- ac29 9mo ago
mikestew 9mo ago
I want the old plan back. If we went over the 50Gb/month, there was the option of continuing on at $1/Gb, which is the same price per Gb as the base plan. IOW, they didn't punish you for going over. Now if we go over, it's either put up with slow speed data, or upgrade to unlimited.
- steffan 9mo ago
  This is the equivalent of having the previous 50GB base plan and going over by $50 worth of data (an additional 50GB). If you were routinely going 50GB over the 50GB plan, I'd suggest that maybe a 50GB plan wasn't the right plan for you. Under the old plan, 100GB of data would have cost $100. Residential unlimited is $120, so for most users this would seem like an improvement.
  - mikestew 9mo ago
    That's the thing, we don't regularly go over 50Gb. Probably won't go over 100Gb, either. But if we do, it's either slow speeds, or pay $165/month for unlimited roam every single month we use it, versus paying a little extra for the few times we go over.
    - shibapuppie 9mo ago
      So you're mad you're paying the same for double the data, of which it wasn't completely used beforehand anyway. You do you, I guess.
      - mikestew 9mo ago
        My comment says nothing about being mad, nor that data go unused every month. But you do you and read it however you want, I guess.
        mynameisvlad 9mo ago
        > nor that data go unused every month > we don't regularly go over 50Gb I mean, you did. And now, even if you did go over 50GB, you get 50 more GB to use at the same price. If you barely went over before, then you will likely not use up the extra 50GB, and therefore are paying less than before for the same usage.
_blk 9mo ago
Awesome news. When we started RV traveling we wanted to do the 50G plan whenever we were out of cell-range but it turned out to be such a convenient service that 50G didn't last us more than 3 days so we switched to unlimited and haven't regretted it. Absolutely worth it because even the residential dish works flawlessly while driving and the kids can game and stream all at the same time from the pickup. I put some more details on my blog if you're interested in power specs or DNS options on the router, etc. https://bitcreed.us/bitblog/starlink-on-the-road https://bitcreed.us/bitblog/starlink-on-the-road You can also start on the 100G plan and when you run out of data switch to unlimited right from the app. That'll bring down the first-month bill a tad and give you a chance to gauge the "slow speed" option.
- ralfd 9mo ago
  Can one downgrade back from unlimited too 100?
  - _blk 9mo ago
    I just checked my Starlink app and if I wanted to downgrade mine it says the change would be effective at the beginning of the next monthly billing period. So looks like you can downgrade every month and upgrade any time. Sounds fair to me.
    - mikestew 9mo ago
      Thanks for this. I now withdraw my previous objections to the change. If we blow past the 100Gb, just upgrade, then remember to downgrade before the next month.
mattmaroon 9mo ago
That’s great for me. I use it mainly for work (food trucks, not much data) but sometimes I’ll use it for personal stuff like weekend camping and hit the 50. Now I can just not worry about it ever.
lta 9mo ago
Regardless of the price and the data, I'd never subscribe to this service due to the owner. I'm looking forward for alternatives from a more neutral vendor
- syntaxing 9mo ago
  I’m 100% on the same boat. The only competitor I can see is Amazon Leo. Having options is great but they both suck.
  - hinkley 9mo ago
    As if Bezos is better. Elon has a much higher slope but he’s got a head start to catch up on, before they’re all hunting humans for sport on Ellison’s private island.
    - whimsicalism 9mo ago
      https://x.com/elonmusk/status/2009171282030653877 https://x.com/elonmusk/status/2009171282030653877 I disagree that Bezos & Elon are comparably bad.
      - permo-w 9mo ago
        you're all over this thread seemingly trying to get someone to argue this point with you, or perhaps just to prove how nuts Elon is, as if people don't already know that, for example, from the time he did a nazi salute in public to a crowd
        quietsegfault 9mo ago
        You're all over the thread actually arguing with people over things that don't relate to the article as well. Pot, kettle.
        permo-w 9mo ago
iloveitaly 9mo ago
Really interesting that Starlink continues to improve the service when they have an absolute monopoly on fast, portable satellite internet.
- lateforwork 9mo ago
  Absolutely monopoly? You mean other than Kuiper, right? https://www.aboutamazon.com/news/innovation-at-amazon/what-is-amazon-project-kuiper https://www.aboutamazon.com/news/innovation-at-amazon/what-i...
  - mikeyouse 9mo ago
    How many customers does Kuiper have at present?
  - spullara 9mo ago
    that entire page is in future tense
- IncreasePosts 9mo ago
  Makes sense. Make your service good enough with your rocket+satellite synergy that competitors would need to spend $500B to be competitive.
- bluGill 9mo ago
  They are interested in other markets where they don't have a monopoly though. Most of the time my cell phone has fast 5g internet, and my cell phone company is trying to sell me on their 5g internet (I have fibre so I don't see the point). For many potential starlink customers there is competition. If you on the ocean they are the only option. If you travel on land they can be the only option in places but you can probably live with no service in those few places.
  - carlosjobim 9mo ago
    Satellite internet's main selling point is for use in remote locations.
dutchuser 9mo ago
[dead]
HumblyTossed 9mo ago
I know this is probably niche, but it would be nice to be able to buy, say, 50GB and have a year to use.
ibejoeb 9mo ago
This makes the $50/mo plan viable for wan failover. Still have the cgnat issue, but there's some documentation about requesting an ipv4 address from support. Has anyone succeeded with that?
class3shock 9mo ago
Has anyone used starlink for remoting into a work desktop? If so was the latency bearable?
- porkloin 9mo ago
  I work remotely and use a starlink mini for work and general internet usage since I road trip in the summer a lot. For work I'm not using doing RDP/remote desktop stuff since I have a company-issued laptop, but I have some experience using it to stream graphics-intensive games from my home PC with a nice GPU to my phone with a mobile controller attached to it. I saw around 50-100ms of latency in ideal conditions with a clear view of the sky. There are distinct large latency spikes every 30ish minutes, which I think is due to the dish switching between different satellites. I think the latency would be fine for working, but it will hardly be transparent. When using it to play games, I've mostly stuck to stuff that doesn't require fast responses or parry mechanics, etc. Even without RDP-ing into another workstation, the latency spikes on video calls can be noticeable. Moment-to-moment video conferencing latency is totally fine, given that most of the major players in the space have pretty good latency compensation baked in. A few details/complications: - I'm usually within ~500 miles of my home, which is relevant because starlink satellites communicate with ground stations, and being closer to home will still have a meaningful impact on latency - host PC is on a wired fiber connection - I live relatively far north (~65N) and starlink's network isn't biased toward polar orbiting satellites, so my coverage probaby isn't representative of behavior further south. You can see a map of satellites and note the relatively poor arctic and subarctic region coverage here: https://satellitemap.space/ https://satellitemap.space/
  - shibapuppie 9mo ago
    >There are distinct large latency spikes every 30ish minutes, which I think is due to the dish switching between different satellites. The satellites are in Low Earth Orbit and zipping across the sky at an extremely high rate of speed. If you were in the middle of absolutely flat nowhere-land, you could maybe get a few minutes on a single satellite before it goes over the horizon, not 30 minutes.
LorenDB 9mo ago
I just wish they would bring back their experimental $40 plan (and make it available in my area).
whimsicalism 9mo ago
Don't like what the guy says [0], but this is incredible technology and I'm impressed by how early we are getting it. [0]: https://x.com/elonmusk/status/2009171282030653877 https://x.com/elonmusk/status/2009171282030653877
- deleted 9mo ago
  [deleted]
film42 9mo ago
I spend a lot of time out of reception and starlink has been fantastic. So much so that I leave it on anytime I'm driving where I have cellular reception because it's just consistently good. I get ~100Mbps whether it's a forest service road, ATV trail, or on the highway through curvy mountain passes. I'm on the 50GB plan so doubling for free is very nice, but it looks like they yanked the ability to optionally purchase additional high speed data for $1/GB. Maybe it's still there?
- stickfigure 9mo ago
  Looks like you can upgrade to the $165/mo tier if you want more.
Swoerd 9mo ago
[dead]
ost-ing 9mo ago
Musk has excellent products but I wouldn't give him a dime. I have no problem with conservative politics, but his flavour is well beyond that.
- dayyan 9mo ago
  Thanks for letting us all know. We needed to hear that. /s
- kiwijamo 9mo ago
  Agreed although it's getting to the point that other companies are now using Starlink to provide other services so I've often used Starlink (even if indirectly) without realising it. For example I go tramping and pretty much every remote accomodation I've stayed at use Starlink. My mobile provider uses Starlink for direct-to-cell services. My national airline uses Starlink as backhaul for their in-flight WiFi. I know there are other competitors coming who aim to provide alternatives to Starlink -- this should mean at some point accomodation providers, mobile networks, airlines, etc can switch to them.
35mm 9mo ago
At least it's not like my mobile service, which when I run out of data also disables the payment provider for their web portal to buy more data.
igl 9mo ago
The willingness to keep backing his companies, despite his political trajectory, is honestly hard to understand.
MORPHOICES 9mo ago
[dead]
huydotnet 9mo ago
Unrelated to the conversation, but the post title was something like "Starlink roam 50GB is now 100GB and unlimited slow speed after that", then a minute later it's now "Roam 50GB is now Roam 100GB". Was this change made by a mod or OP, and why would someone making that change? I do think the original title was more descriptive, and the new title was completely out of context, or it's imply that everyone is using Starlink and know what's Roam 50GB is.
- csto12 9mo ago
  I believe there is a rule where the HN title should mirror the article’s title
- galkk 9mo ago
  Yes, this is weird title change.
- _vqpz 9mo ago
  I guess the idea is that the Starlink URL is displayed after the title so it's redundant, but it definitely makes it impossible to understand at first glance if you're unfamiliar with Starlink service names
- taschmex 9mo ago
  The HN website shows the host part of the URL right next to the title, so it says "Roam 50GB is now Roam 100GB (starlink.com)", but it looks strange in my RSS reader
- darknavi 9mo ago
  The guidelines[0] state: > ... > Otherwise please use the original title, unless it is misleading or linkbait; don't editorialize. 0: https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
  - nine_k 9mo ago
    I would say that omitting the crucial detail about the unlimited slow speed access is pretty misleading. It's a difference between needing to set up a fallback channel, and not, which halves the complexity.
apitman 9mo ago
I had free Starlink wifi on a recent flight (Hawaiian) and it was an insanely better internet experience than I've ever had on a plane.
stack_framer 9mo ago
Comments about Elon on HN have become exhaustingly cringe; dripping with devout derision, reeking of righteous reproach, and smacking of sanctimonious seething. Apparently we must all gnash our teeth at the mere mention of "that man" or anything associated with him. It's as plebeian as it is predictable. I'm sure this will now be downvoted into oblivion and I'll be accused of "defending an avowed racist" or some other such nonsense.
Tepix 9mo ago
Starlink has short contract duration. That means they can also increase prices at short notice. It's happened in the past (in particular for sailors). You may think you're getting a good deal on your Starlink dish. However, when prices suddenly increase or conditions worsen, you have no recourse.
- arjie 9mo ago
  The actual thing I've experienced is they've added cheaper plans, given us coastal coverage, and international coverage. I've had it since 2024 and between the Google Fiber at home and Starlink on the move, I think this has been overall A+ experience. 5/5 on both. Besides, there's no real alternative to Starlink right now and their price is very reasonable. If the price rose a lot I'd use the pause/resume feature or the tiny 10 G plan.
jll29 9mo ago
Slightly off-topic: does anyone know how to reach Starlink by phone or email? They started billing me but I never received a sat dish. And their support Website is a chatbot :-(.
- dan-allen 9mo ago
  Oh lord. Sorry they’re doing that to you. Chargeback?
- inemesitaffia 9mo ago
  There's a phone number. Ask or search the Starlink subreddit. Failing that call your national Telecoms regulator
tintor 9mo ago
What is advantage of Starlink Residental over Roam?
- inemesitaffia 9mo ago
  Better QOS/QCI
rootusrootus 9mo ago
Maybe I'm just greedy, but I'd like an in between option. Maybe you could argue that this is it, I suppose. I have Starlink in standby mode ($5/mo) as a backup for my primary Comcast ($110/mo) connection. At 500 Kbps, the Starlink connection tends to be fairly useless if the Comcast connection fails, aside from having just enough bandwidth to use it to activate full service. But real Starlink service is over $100/mo and still significantly lower capacity and quality than Comcast (when it is working normally), so it's hard to want to pay that for it as a backup. Rather than an arbitrary data cap, I'd love to have a mediocre-but-still-cheap option that could actually handle my regular non-streaming needs for occasional use. Maybe 2 Mbps and $20/month, something like that.

295 points by bahmboo 9mo ago

Nice that instead of completely cutting you off at the cap they put it in super slow 500 kbits. That is actually usable and used to be the fastest speed you could get at home.

vidarh 9mo ago
My first company was an ISP, and our selling point was that we had higher bandwith out of Norway than any competitors in our price range.... A whopping 512kps.
- reactordev 9mo ago
  Mmmmm ISDN copper…
  - barbazoo 9mo ago
    If I remember right we could get 64kb/s or 128kb/s if you bundled them, that was in Germany. But also, we didn't have that, we only had a 56kb/s modem and I remember really wanting ISDN when I was a kid :)
    - vardump 9mo ago
      ISDN (IDSL) was max 144 kbit/s. Two 64 kbit/s channels and one 16 kbit/s control channel all bundled together.
      - reactordev 9mo ago
        Or four bonded twin-64kbit channels with a multiplexer. Ahhh, high school…
  - vidarh 9mo ago
    Copper, but not ISDN. Fractional E1 leased line. There were expensive and limited ISDN connections available in Norway at the time ('95), but not cost effective for an ISP.
    - reactordev 9mo ago
      I was in Northern Virginia at the time enjoying this new thing called AOL.
- AdamJacobMuller 9mo ago
  I remember being amazingly excited to have saved up enough money to go to the store and buy a 33.6 modem (an amazing upgrade from my 14.4). A year or so later I upgraded to a v.92 only to realize my ISP (I think it was IDT at the time) didn't support that and only supported some other 56k "standard" (details are sketchy on this, I was like 12). I was devastated and it was too late to drive back to computer city to exchange it for the correct one. Now I have 10G symmetric in my house.
jcims 9mo ago
Still with pretty low latency (25-35ms) as well (similar to the Standby (aka pause) state you can put the account into for $5/mo)
- rootusrootus 9mo ago
  The standby account -is- 500 kbps, probably it's the same mode, so I'd expect the same performance. Anecdotally, even though I'd have told you that 500 was probably enough for non-streaming stuff that I do most of the time, in my experience when my connection switches over to Starlink (I have Comcast primarily, but it has had reliability problems the last few months), it usually hits the Starlink limits pretty hard. I've never identified any nefarious activity, it just seems like all the little things on my workstations and various devices that chatter add up to enough to trigger Starlink's controls.
SkyPuncher 9mo ago
That's faster than my cell phone in the areas where I desperately need Starlink....500kb > 0
- TN1ck 9mo ago
  Be aware that it is bits, so 62.5kb. But I agree, the internet is still usable with that.
  - mlyle 9mo ago
    People always use bits for connectivity. 62.5kB/sec -- maybe really 55-60kB/sec downloaded. Or 18 seconds to get a megabyte. This is simultaneously fast (on my 14400 bps modem that I spent the most time "waiting for downloading", I was used to 12-13 minutes per megabyte vs. 18 seconds here) and slow (the google homepage is >1MB, so until you have resources cached you're waiting tens of seconds). It would be nice if everything were just a touch more efficient.
    - volemo 9mo ago
      Is Google homepage consisting of a text input field and like ten buttons really over a megabyte? Damn.
      - mlyle 9mo ago
        I end up transferring 940kB (with a lot of blocking cranked up). Typing "hello" in the search bar takes it up to 1MB. Then the first page of search results is another 1.3MB. Now, I assume all of this would start working before it's all transferred. But we're still talking about tens of seconds of transfer at 500kbit/sec. (And Google at least acts like they care about bandwidth a little. So many 15megabyte pages out there...)
  - namanyayg 9mo ago
    I've never heard bandwidth being expressed in bytes. But if we're being pedantic then I'd like to throw my hat in and call it 62.5kB. Or even better, 62.5KiB (for kibibyte)
mikestew 9mo ago
No, not nice. Previously, if we exceeded the 50Gb cap, there was the option to continue on at high-speed for $1/Gb. And that's the same price per Gb as the base plan of 50Gb/month for $50. Now, it's either upgrade to unlimited, or enjoy Netflix at 500Kbps. I want the old plan back.
- scottyah 9mo ago
  Now the cap is 100G. Seems like an odd complaint. Did you often exceed 100Gb?
  - mikestew 9mo ago
    It's unlikely that we will exceed 100Gb/month in the camper. But if we do, it's either slow speeds, or pay $165/month for unlimited roam every single month we use it, versus paying a little extra for the few times we go over. In the end, it'll probably work out okay for us, but I liked the previous option of being able to get high-speed data at a reasonable price should we go over the limit.
    - natch 9mo ago
      Fortunately 1. For slow speeds, it’s not like you have to live with that slowness every day. The impact is limited to the remaining few days of the month where you ran up against the 100GB, so the either-or in your statement looks worse than it is; and 2. Starlink makes it dead easy to switch from plan to plan right in the app so you can go right back to a lower plan when the higher one is not needed. With the caveat that they do change what plans are available sometimes as we’re seeing here.
- ralfd 9mo ago
  If I calculate correctly then 500 kbps is actually enough for Netflix in standard quality. If one wants to binge watch 4K (7 GB per hour) then the unlimited plan makes more sense anyway.
- lukevp 9mo ago
  Wait, the price didn’t change though did it? So you get 100 gigs for the price of 50 before?
sib 9mo ago
The first modem that I owned was 1200 baud. The first one that I used was 110 and it was exciting when it was upgraded to 300. It took ~20 years from when I first got online until my home internet reached 512kbps.
- hinkley 9mo ago
  I bought a cheap 1200 and then once I had use for it I saved up for a USR 14.4 with a shiny extruded aluminum case. At one point I was sharing that with two roommates using SLIP and surplussed Cisco coaxial NICs.
doublerabbit 9mo ago
Good enough to play Quake 3 Arena.
Sammi 9mo ago
You might just be able to stream 240p youtube without stuttering with that.
danpalmer 9mo ago
I'd disagree that that is usable today. A few days ago I had some network trouble that restricted me to about 350kbps, although stable without much packet loss, and a lot of stuff just didn't practically work. At that speed, loading images and resources on webpages within timeout limits is hard. Many web apps don't work, or degrade enough that you wouldn't want to use them. Also what do we actually use the web for? A lot of streaming video and audio that won't work. A lot of reading webpages with a lot of images and ads, that won't work. I'm sure that Wikipedia would load and work slowly, but that's not really representative of web usage today. There's a separate argument about whether the web should be like that, but regardless of your thoughts on that, it is like that.
- digiown 9mo ago
  I hope we get LLM browser agents that will convert the web back to that state again. You can get sorta close now with adblockers, various "lite" modes, and unofficial client sites, but it would be nice if it were universal.
  - danpalmer 9mo ago
    This is a separate discussion, but while I agree in general that pages should be less bloated than they are, ads shouldn't burn my CPU, etc, I think it's a sign of progress that the web takes much more bandwidth. 4K video is better than HD, is better than SD, is better than no video. Illustrations improve articles. More client side Javascript tends to mean more interactivity which is often a good thing (not always). The web today does so much more than it did 20 years ago, and we should be proud of that achievement rather than push back on progress by expecting the web to work on a connection from 20 years ago.
- olyjohn 9mo ago
  Set your device to "metered network" and all the background shit will stop running. That's what I had to do to get my Starlink mini working in Standby mode. As soon as your device is on WiFi it thinks it's a free for all and starts updating and downloading shit in the background. The 500KB/sec is more than enough as long as that isn't happening.
gramie 9mo ago
> used to be the fastest speed you could get at home My 1200 baud from 1987 would beg to differ. Granted, that was for bulletin boards, not the WWW (which hadn't been invented yet).

deleted 9mo ago

[deleted]

Aurornis 9mo ago

That's not bad for the cheap plan. Even the slow mode is fast enough for video conferencing and doing basic remote work. They still have a separate unlimited plan for anyone who needs more.

Neywiny 9mo ago
They explicitly say video streaming will be "limited" aka it won't work like you want it to
- bahmboo 9mo ago
  I haven't done a video call on it but it does work for youtube. It's best to pause a video at the start but it buffers and plays just fine. Blocky but certainly watchable.
- mattmaroon 9mo ago
  If the data speed is sufficient but they’re intentionally throttling video you could maybe get around it a VPN.
- Aurornis 9mo ago
  Zoom works in 500kbps environments in my experience. You won't be in crispy 720p or 1080p, but you can still talk to other people.
  - olyjohn 9mo ago
    I had a shitty DSL line just a couple years ago before Starlink. Maybe 700KBps if I was lucky. Both me and my partner could remotely work on it, run zoom calls at the same time. That said, it is nice to have more bandwidth, but people do vastly overestimate how much they really need.
  - userbinator 9mo ago
    but you can still talk to other people As should be the case, as GSM half-rate works at 5.6kbps (700 bytes per second) and gives intelligible speech.

renewiltord 9mo ago

I’ve kept it on the backup service for 10 GB at $10 or whatever and it’s pretty cool. Used it off my balcony in SF when Google Fiber had a 1 hr outage, take it on road trips, and stuff like that. Totally worth it.

deleted 9mo ago

[deleted]

Someone1234 9mo ago

I'm actually a huge fan of "unlimited slow speeds" as a falloff, instead of a cliff. Aside from the fact it allows you to work with Starlink to buy more fast speed, it also allows core stuff to continue to function (e.g. basic notifications, non-streaming web traffic, etc).

frognumber 9mo ago
Years ago, I picked cell carrier because of this. When I ran out, it switched to O(200kbps), which is fine for email, basic web search, etc. It was actually a bit ironic that, at the time, you could burn through the whole high-speed quota in seconds or minutes, if you went to the wrong web page. Most carriers would stop or bill you an arm-and-a-leg after.
- kotaKat 9mo ago
  5G data roaming is hilarious for this. Verizon offered 500MB of high speed data roaming per day in Canada before throttling down to ~128kbps. I ran one single speedtest in the middle of Ottawa on Rogers 5G, didn't even finish the speedtest (hitting an error at the end that it failed), and got the text message going "You've run out of high speed data today. Do you want to buy another 500MB for $5?" At least it's 2GB/day now. And my 5G roaming is off...
  - londons_explore 9mo ago
    Roaming in some countries is like $10,000/gigabyte... At that price, I dunno why they offer it at all. Are they just hoping to sue someone to get their whole house because they once watched some netflix overseas and forgot to use wifi?
    - kalleboo 9mo ago
      They were deals that were made back in the WAP days where spending $1 a few times a day to check your business email made some semblance of sense, that then got neglected.

PaulDavisThe1st 9mo ago

They could make it 1000GB for US$10/month and I still wouldn't give any money to a company associated with that man.

wtfHN26 9mo ago
That's such an unique viewpoint that no one has expressed on the internet. Thank you for bringing value to this comments section.
- PaulDavisThe1st 9mo ago
  I was hoping to bring my karma down a bit.
- deleted 9mo ago
  [deleted]
- buellerbueller 9mo ago
  Et tu, wtfHN26.
- afavour 9mo ago
  I'm surprised that you signed up for an account just to say something this empty
  - IncreasePosts 9mo ago
    Just FYI you accidentally replied to wtfHN26 instead of PaulDavisThe1st
  - MosuraGinniren 9mo ago
    [dead]
selectively 9mo ago
You are good.

behnamoh 9mo ago

Finally I can use Codex/OpenCode even out in the woods. No work-life balance; just vibing everywhere I go.

scottyah 9mo ago
Haha vibe coding is pretty addictive. Maybe vibe code an app that tells you how to improve work life balance in the woods ;) Youtubing how to deal with a snakebite might come in more handy.
olyjohn 9mo ago
[delayed]

gregsadetsky 9mo ago

I had a “hit” post on bsky [0] (90 likes, big numbers for me) asking whether people would want an unlimited mobile plan throttled at 256kbps for $2/month. Seems like yes? There’s lots to say about how useable it is (I often get throttled when traveling and it’s really not that bad + it helps curb any desire to scroll videos!) But mainly I want to ask - I looked into it for a minute and it seems like you couldn’t start an mvno because carriers wouldn’t let you cannibalize them? You can get very cheap IoT plans but if you tried reselling IoT as esims for consumers, the carriers would kill it? So yeah - Starlink to mobile is actually the only viable way that routes around this problem? (((email in profile if you’re cuckoo enough like me and want to start a self service’d throttled mvno))) [0] https://bsky.app/profile/greg.technology/post/3mbmwsytnyc23 https://bsky.app/profile/greg.technology/post/3mbmwsytnyc23

CyberDildonics 9mo ago
This doesn't seem to have anything to do with the current advertisement being discussed.
- gregsadetsky 9mo ago
  Sorry yes - I think it does. Starlink sats can already offer 5G service directly to mobile phones (from the sky!!) And there are other comments here talking about this specifically - how unlimited bandwidth throttled plans are actually useful and would be great to have.
1234letshaveatw 9mo ago
Not just you, that might be a overall record for bsky?
anewhnaccount2 9mo ago
There is something like this but twice the prive in Finland https://www.moi.fi/laitenetti https://www.moi.fi/laitenetti . Can't make outgoing calls but there are pay as you internet call out services for that occaddional use case.
ac29 9mo ago

mikestew 9mo ago

I want the old plan back. If we went over the 50Gb/month, there was the option of continuing on at $1/Gb, which is the same price per Gb as the base plan. IOW, they didn't punish you for going over. Now if we go over, it's either put up with slow speed data, or upgrade to unlimited.

steffan 9mo ago
This is the equivalent of having the previous 50GB base plan and going over by $50 worth of data (an additional 50GB). If you were routinely going 50GB over the 50GB plan, I'd suggest that maybe a 50GB plan wasn't the right plan for you. Under the old plan, 100GB of data would have cost $100. Residential unlimited is $120, so for most users this would seem like an improvement.
- mikestew 9mo ago
  That's the thing, we don't regularly go over 50Gb. Probably won't go over 100Gb, either. But if we do, it's either slow speeds, or pay $165/month for unlimited roam every single month we use it, versus paying a little extra for the few times we go over.
  - shibapuppie 9mo ago
    So you're mad you're paying the same for double the data, of which it wasn't completely used beforehand anyway. You do you, I guess.
    - mikestew 9mo ago
      My comment says nothing about being mad, nor that data go unused every month. But you do you and read it however you want, I guess.
      - mynameisvlad 9mo ago
        > nor that data go unused every month > we don't regularly go over 50Gb I mean, you did. And now, even if you did go over 50GB, you get 50 more GB to use at the same price. If you barely went over before, then you will likely not use up the extra 50GB, and therefore are paying less than before for the same usage.

_blk 9mo ago

Awesome news. When we started RV traveling we wanted to do the 50G plan whenever we were out of cell-range but it turned out to be such a convenient service that 50G didn't last us more than 3 days so we switched to unlimited and haven't regretted it. Absolutely worth it because even the residential dish works flawlessly while driving and the kids can game and stream all at the same time from the pickup. I put some more details on my blog if you're interested in power specs or DNS options on the router, etc. https://bitcreed.us/bitblog/starlink-on-the-road https://bitcreed.us/bitblog/starlink-on-the-road You can also start on the 100G plan and when you run out of data switch to unlimited right from the app. That'll bring down the first-month bill a tad and give you a chance to gauge the "slow speed" option.

ralfd 9mo ago
Can one downgrade back from unlimited too 100?
- _blk 9mo ago
  I just checked my Starlink app and if I wanted to downgrade mine it says the change would be effective at the beginning of the next monthly billing period. So looks like you can downgrade every month and upgrade any time. Sounds fair to me.
  - mikestew 9mo ago
    Thanks for this. I now withdraw my previous objections to the change. If we blow past the 100Gb, just upgrade, then remember to downgrade before the next month.

mattmaroon 9mo ago

That’s great for me. I use it mainly for work (food trucks, not much data) but sometimes I’ll use it for personal stuff like weekend camping and hit the 50. Now I can just not worry about it ever.

lta 9mo ago

Regardless of the price and the data, I'd never subscribe to this service due to the owner. I'm looking forward for alternatives from a more neutral vendor

syntaxing 9mo ago
I’m 100% on the same boat. The only competitor I can see is Amazon Leo. Having options is great but they both suck.
- hinkley 9mo ago
  As if Bezos is better. Elon has a much higher slope but he’s got a head start to catch up on, before they’re all hunting humans for sport on Ellison’s private island.
  - whimsicalism 9mo ago
    https://x.com/elonmusk/status/2009171282030653877 https://x.com/elonmusk/status/2009171282030653877 I disagree that Bezos & Elon are comparably bad.
    - permo-w 9mo ago
      you're all over this thread seemingly trying to get someone to argue this point with you, or perhaps just to prove how nuts Elon is, as if people don't already know that, for example, from the time he did a nazi salute in public to a crowd
      - quietsegfault 9mo ago
        You're all over the thread actually arguing with people over things that don't relate to the article as well. Pot, kettle.
        permo-w 9mo ago

iloveitaly 9mo ago

Really interesting that Starlink continues to improve the service when they have an absolute monopoly on fast, portable satellite internet.

lateforwork 9mo ago
Absolutely monopoly? You mean other than Kuiper, right? https://www.aboutamazon.com/news/innovation-at-amazon/what-is-amazon-project-kuiper https://www.aboutamazon.com/news/innovation-at-amazon/what-i...
- mikeyouse 9mo ago
  How many customers does Kuiper have at present?
- spullara 9mo ago
  that entire page is in future tense
IncreasePosts 9mo ago
Makes sense. Make your service good enough with your rocket+satellite synergy that competitors would need to spend $500B to be competitive.
bluGill 9mo ago
They are interested in other markets where they don't have a monopoly though. Most of the time my cell phone has fast 5g internet, and my cell phone company is trying to sell me on their 5g internet (I have fibre so I don't see the point). For many potential starlink customers there is competition. If you on the ocean they are the only option. If you travel on land they can be the only option in places but you can probably live with no service in those few places.
- carlosjobim 9mo ago
  Satellite internet's main selling point is for use in remote locations.

dutchuser 9mo ago

[dead]

HumblyTossed 9mo ago

I know this is probably niche, but it would be nice to be able to buy, say, 50GB and have a year to use.

ibejoeb 9mo ago

This makes the $50/mo plan viable for wan failover. Still have the cgnat issue, but there's some documentation about requesting an ipv4 address from support. Has anyone succeeded with that?

class3shock 9mo ago

Has anyone used starlink for remoting into a work desktop? If so was the latency bearable?

porkloin 9mo ago
I work remotely and use a starlink mini for work and general internet usage since I road trip in the summer a lot. For work I'm not using doing RDP/remote desktop stuff since I have a company-issued laptop, but I have some experience using it to stream graphics-intensive games from my home PC with a nice GPU to my phone with a mobile controller attached to it. I saw around 50-100ms of latency in ideal conditions with a clear view of the sky. There are distinct large latency spikes every 30ish minutes, which I think is due to the dish switching between different satellites. I think the latency would be fine for working, but it will hardly be transparent. When using it to play games, I've mostly stuck to stuff that doesn't require fast responses or parry mechanics, etc. Even without RDP-ing into another workstation, the latency spikes on video calls can be noticeable. Moment-to-moment video conferencing latency is totally fine, given that most of the major players in the space have pretty good latency compensation baked in. A few details/complications: - I'm usually within ~500 miles of my home, which is relevant because starlink satellites communicate with ground stations, and being closer to home will still have a meaningful impact on latency - host PC is on a wired fiber connection - I live relatively far north (~65N) and starlink's network isn't biased toward polar orbiting satellites, so my coverage probaby isn't representative of behavior further south. You can see a map of satellites and note the relatively poor arctic and subarctic region coverage here: https://satellitemap.space/ https://satellitemap.space/
- shibapuppie 9mo ago
  >There are distinct large latency spikes every 30ish minutes, which I think is due to the dish switching between different satellites. The satellites are in Low Earth Orbit and zipping across the sky at an extremely high rate of speed. If you were in the middle of absolutely flat nowhere-land, you could maybe get a few minutes on a single satellite before it goes over the horizon, not 30 minutes.

LorenDB 9mo ago

I just wish they would bring back their experimental $40 plan (and make it available in my area).

whimsicalism 9mo ago

Don't like what the guy says [0], but this is incredible technology and I'm impressed by how early we are getting it. [0]: https://x.com/elonmusk/status/2009171282030653877 https://x.com/elonmusk/status/2009171282030653877

deleted 9mo ago
[deleted]

film42 9mo ago

I spend a lot of time out of reception and starlink has been fantastic. So much so that I leave it on anytime I'm driving where I have cellular reception because it's just consistently good. I get ~100Mbps whether it's a forest service road, ATV trail, or on the highway through curvy mountain passes. I'm on the 50GB plan so doubling for free is very nice, but it looks like they yanked the ability to optionally purchase additional high speed data for $1/GB. Maybe it's still there?

stickfigure 9mo ago
Looks like you can upgrade to the $165/mo tier if you want more.

Swoerd 9mo ago

[dead]

ost-ing 9mo ago

Musk has excellent products but I wouldn't give him a dime. I have no problem with conservative politics, but his flavour is well beyond that.

dayyan 9mo ago
Thanks for letting us all know. We needed to hear that. /s
kiwijamo 9mo ago
Agreed although it's getting to the point that other companies are now using Starlink to provide other services so I've often used Starlink (even if indirectly) without realising it. For example I go tramping and pretty much every remote accomodation I've stayed at use Starlink. My mobile provider uses Starlink for direct-to-cell services. My national airline uses Starlink as backhaul for their in-flight WiFi. I know there are other competitors coming who aim to provide alternatives to Starlink -- this should mean at some point accomodation providers, mobile networks, airlines, etc can switch to them.

35mm 9mo ago

At least it's not like my mobile service, which when I run out of data also disables the payment provider for their web portal to buy more data.

igl 9mo ago

The willingness to keep backing his companies, despite his political trajectory, is honestly hard to understand.

MORPHOICES 9mo ago

[dead]

huydotnet 9mo ago

Unrelated to the conversation, but the post title was something like "Starlink roam 50GB is now 100GB and unlimited slow speed after that", then a minute later it's now "Roam 50GB is now Roam 100GB". Was this change made by a mod or OP, and why would someone making that change? I do think the original title was more descriptive, and the new title was completely out of context, or it's imply that everyone is using Starlink and know what's Roam 50GB is.

csto12 9mo ago
I believe there is a rule where the HN title should mirror the article’s title
galkk 9mo ago
Yes, this is weird title change.
_vqpz 9mo ago
I guess the idea is that the Starlink URL is displayed after the title so it's redundant, but it definitely makes it impossible to understand at first glance if you're unfamiliar with Starlink service names
taschmex 9mo ago
The HN website shows the host part of the URL right next to the title, so it says "Roam 50GB is now Roam 100GB (starlink.com)", but it looks strange in my RSS reader
darknavi 9mo ago
The guidelines[0] state: > ... > Otherwise please use the original title, unless it is misleading or linkbait; don't editorialize. 0: https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
- nine_k 9mo ago
  I would say that omitting the crucial detail about the unlimited slow speed access is pretty misleading. It's a difference between needing to set up a fallback channel, and not, which halves the complexity.

apitman 9mo ago

I had free Starlink wifi on a recent flight (Hawaiian) and it was an insanely better internet experience than I've ever had on a plane.

stack_framer 9mo ago

Comments about Elon on HN have become exhaustingly cringe; dripping with devout derision, reeking of righteous reproach, and smacking of sanctimonious seething. Apparently we must all gnash our teeth at the mere mention of "that man" or anything associated with him. It's as plebeian as it is predictable. I'm sure this will now be downvoted into oblivion and I'll be accused of "defending an avowed racist" or some other such nonsense.

Tepix 9mo ago

Starlink has short contract duration. That means they can also increase prices at short notice. It's happened in the past (in particular for sailors). You may think you're getting a good deal on your Starlink dish. However, when prices suddenly increase or conditions worsen, you have no recourse.

arjie 9mo ago
The actual thing I've experienced is they've added cheaper plans, given us coastal coverage, and international coverage. I've had it since 2024 and between the Google Fiber at home and Starlink on the move, I think this has been overall A+ experience. 5/5 on both. Besides, there's no real alternative to Starlink right now and their price is very reasonable. If the price rose a lot I'd use the pause/resume feature or the tiny 10 G plan.

jll29 9mo ago

Slightly off-topic: does anyone know how to reach Starlink by phone or email? They started billing me but I never received a sat dish. And their support Website is a chatbot :-(.

dan-allen 9mo ago
Oh lord. Sorry they’re doing that to you. Chargeback?
inemesitaffia 9mo ago
There's a phone number. Ask or search the Starlink subreddit. Failing that call your national Telecoms regulator

tintor 9mo ago

What is advantage of Starlink Residental over Roam?

inemesitaffia 9mo ago
Better QOS/QCI

rootusrootus 9mo ago

Maybe I'm just greedy, but I'd like an in between option. Maybe you could argue that this is it, I suppose. I have Starlink in standby mode ($5/mo) as a backup for my primary Comcast ($110/mo) connection. At 500 Kbps, the Starlink connection tends to be fairly useless if the Comcast connection fails, aside from having just enough bandwidth to use it to activate full service. But real Starlink service is over $100/mo and still significantly lower capacity and quality than Comcast (when it is working normally), so it's hard to want to pay that for it as a backup. Rather than an arbitrary data cap, I'd love to have a mediocre-but-still-cheap option that could actually handle my regular non-streaming needs for occasional use. Maybe 2 Mbps and $20/month, something like that.