Roam 50GB is now Roam 100GB

https://starlink.com/support/article/58c9c8b7-474e-246f-7e3c-06db3221d34d

by bahmboo • 6 months ago

295 346 6 months ago

bahmboo2• 6 months 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.

vidarh2• 6 months 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.

reactordev3• 6 months ago

Mmmmm ISDN copper…

AdamJacobMuller• 6 months 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• 6 months 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)

rootusrootus3• 6 months 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• 6 months ago

That's faster than my cell phone in the areas where I desperately need Starlink....500kb > 0

TN1ck• 6 months ago

Be aware that it is bits, so 62.5kb. But I agree, the internet is still usable with that.

mikestew6• 6 months 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.

scottyah2• 6 months ago

Now the cap is 100G. Seems like an odd complaint. Did you often exceed 100Gb?

ralfd2• 6 months 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• 6 months ago

Wait, the price didn’t change though did it? So you get 100 gigs for the price of 50 before?

sib• 6 months 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.

hinkley2• 6 months 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• 6 months ago

Good enough to play Quake 3 Arena.

Sammi• 6 months ago

You might just be able to stream 240p youtube without stuttering with that.

danpalmer3• 6 months 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.

digiown2• 6 months 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.

olyjohn8• 6 months 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.

anthk2• 6 months ago

I lived with 2.7KBPS

- News, phlogs, Wikipedia, translation services -> Gopher or Gemini, gopher://magical.fish and gemini://gemi.dev plus gopher://sdf.org and Bongusta Phlogs. It's magical.

- IRC or IRC+Bitlbee -> IM, Jabber, IRC, most protocols

- Email -> Mbsync+msmtp + mutt. Caching helps there

- Usenet -> Slrn+Slrnpull, it has tech groups, caching and there's a web news discuss group too

- SSH -> Mosh

gramie• 6 months 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).

Aurornis2• 6 months 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• 6 months ago

They explicitly say video streaming will be "limited" aka it won't work like you want it to

bahmboo2• 6 months 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.

mattmaroon6• 6 months ago

If the data speed is sufficient but they’re intentionally throttling video you could maybe get around it a VPN.

Aurornis2• 6 months 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.

renewiltord2• 6 months 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.

Someone12342• 6 months 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• 6 months 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• 6 months 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...

delichon• 6 months ago

As a residential customer Starlink gave me the unlimited slow speed with a free mini for $60/year, as a tease to promote the full speed at $300/year. But it does everything I need it to, so I'm not incentivized to upgrade. I can listen to YouTube audio, make voip calls, download map tiles or talk with a chatbot without limitations. It's a large quality of life improvement for me because in my rural area there is no cellular connection during most of my driving.

QuantumNomad_2• 6 months ago

My mobile data plan is like this. It’s funny because when I’m “out of data” my provider sends an SMS suggesting I upgrade to more gigabytes, but then it still continues to work. And yes I checked my bills to make sure that they are not charging me for any usage excess of what’s included in the plan. It’s not even particularly slow. I can still browse the web, send and receive WhatsApp messages, images and videos, watch videos on TikTok etc.

My current plan is 2GB with rollover. Last month I used 2.5GB, and somehow this month has 2GB included + 2GB rollover = 4 GB available which by itself is also weird. Maybe most of the 2.5 GB I used last month was rollover from the month before that or something.

In total I have used 4.6 GB of mobile data so far this month, which is more than the 4 GB (2+2) I have available for this month and it’s still working.

vachina• 6 months ago

There are still telcos offering 2GB plans. Wow. I’m on the cheapest plan and it comes with 400GB.

coryrc5• 6 months ago

They'd rather you keep paying monthly than start price comparing options.

heraldgeezer3• 6 months ago

Where do you live?

And are you poor?

My 40GB plan is 12$ a month.

consumer451• 6 months ago

I'm actually a huge fan of "unlimited slow speeds" as a falloff, instead of a cliff.

When on cellular, I like to call that "HN-only mode." It is one of the few web properties that is entirely usable at 2G speeds.

Salgat2• 6 months ago

I would kill for a web renaissance to return to this format of webpages, as least as an option. Not only loading improves, but also navigation and accessibility.

qwertox• 6 months ago

I've been listening to 32kbit radio streams while on a 64k falloff. It used to be an important feature for me, the 64k up and down. Sounds like nothing, but is usable.

furyofantares2• 6 months ago

Yeah but it's all links to the other places.

Dylan168075• 6 months ago

2G speeds are awful, and cell companies clearly want it that way since 3G plans throttled to "2G speeds" and 5G plans still usually throttle to "2G speeds".

Starlink is offering 1Mbps here, which is enough for a normal internet experience. It's enough to stream video at 480p or 720p depending on the exact content and encoding settings.

SergeAx• 6 months ago

Telegram Messenger works fine at 2G (bar photos/videos, obviously). I was surprised by it. This is an upside of "building your own crypto" or the MTProto protocol, in their case.

dyauspitr2• 6 months ago

Have they quantified the slow speed? Because when I had Viasat the slow speed so so unbelievably slow it had a hard time loading a regular SPA page in 2-3 minutes.

bscphil2• 6 months ago

I do think it's vastly superior to preferential treatment for some traffic, which seems to be the most popular alternative. The one caveat is that ISPs need to be forced to be transparent about this. Often, with cell providers, it's "Unlimited 5G" advertised, with a tiny asterisk pointing to even tinier disclaimer text at the bottom explaining that they throttle your rates once you hit a (fairly low) cutoff. That type of misleading marketing undercuts the fairness of the offer.

londons_explore3• 6 months ago

Thing is, the heaviest users are often the ones with some malware on their machine using up 100% of the bandwidth. When you limit that to 512kbps, thats still 129 gigabytes a month, on top of the 100 gigabytes a month you let the user use at high speed. When a typical user might use just 10 gigabytes a month, it seems dumb to let one user use 23x what everyone else is paying for/using, especially when that user is most likely just malware infected and not even personally benefiting!

A better limit I think is to limit the user to 10 kbps over a rolling 24h window, 100 kbps over a rolling 1h window, 1Mbits over a rolling 1 minute window, and 10 Mbits over a 1 second window. That way they can quickly check an email or load a web page... But it quickly slows down if they try to (ab)use it for hours on end.

coryrc5• 6 months ago

it seems dumb to let one user use 23x what everyone else is paying for/using

Bandwidth is use-it-or-lose-it. If nobody else was using it, then it doesn't hurt anything. And during high demand traffic shaping hopefully gives their traffic even lower priority.

Dylan168075• 6 months ago

It's not like 100GB is some huge amount of data. It's easy to hit, so if we're judging the overage amount we should be comparing it to the full 100GB, not some made up guy that only uses 10GB. There are users on unlimited consuming many terabytes, and they're not paying all that much more. It's not unfair to anyone if the cheaper plan is able to slowly reach 200GB or 300GB in a minimal-impact way.

Also dropping all the way to 10kbps with enough use would just suck. It's effectively unusable and it would be extreme penny-pinching to make sure the maximum 24/7 user can't squeak out more than 3GB extra on their 100GB plan. You get more variance than that from different month lengths.

bigfatkitten3• 6 months ago

Starlink’s plans vary between markets, but in Australia they have a dirt cheap ($8 AUD per month or something) standby plan that gives you unlimited data capped at something like 500Kbps. If you’re going on a trip and need faster data, you can upgrade to a bigger plan for the rest of the billing month, charged on a pro rata basis, and then revert to the standby plan afterwards.

I used to use Inmarsat BGAN. BGAN would top out at around 250Kbps on a good day, and cost a few bucks per MB on a terminal that cost almost ten times as much as a Starlink Mini.

killingtime742• 6 months ago

I tried this and it's actually even enough to play YouTube at 1080p after some initial buffering. Calls definitely work

Waterluvian• 6 months ago

Mobile has been like this for me for like a decade or so. But in the before times it was just barbaric and ridiculous to either be cut off or absolutely ravaged by fees.

olyjohn8• 6 months ago

I leave my Starlink Mini in Standby Mode, which is $5/mo and is capped at 500KB/sec. I got the dish for free because I'm already a subscriber at home, so adding the $5/mo really isn't a big deal. It's perfect to go camping, because I might want to let my friends know that I had to move campsites, but I don't want to sit there and surf all day long and watch YouTube. Though 500KB/sec is more than enough to do all of that...

Lvl999Noob• 6 months ago

My internet providers (both home wifi and cellular) do this. The problem with unlimited slow speed is that it's too slow. I am sometimes unable to open the carrier's own app and pay for a recharge. Either the app just doesn't open or the transaction in the payments app fails.

PaulDavisThe1st4• 6 months 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• 6 months ago

That's such an unique viewpoint that no one has expressed on the internet.

Thank you for bringing value to this comments section.

PaulDavisThe1st4• 6 months ago

I was hoping to bring my karma down a bit.

buellerbueller4• 6 months ago

Et tu, wtfHN26.

afavour3• 6 months ago

I'm surprised that you signed up for an account just to say something this empty

behnamoh4• 6 months ago

"That man" is the only person so far who's actually helped the Iranian people get their voices heard amidst government shutdown of the entire internet.

Like it or not, Persians love him.

croes• 6 months ago

And Escobar financed hospitals.

The same guy could help some people and kick others in the dirt at the same time.

The same Persians in a western country would be called a threat to western culture by parties Musk endorses

afavour3• 6 months ago

This is a very low effort reply. Does doing one good thing erase all the bad things a person has done? If that's the argument you're making, make it.

hbarka2• 6 months ago

By this logic, Persians also hate him because he played a big factor in destroying USAID, an organization that has helped Iranians in humanitarian aid and disaster relief. Persian-language broadcasting by Voice of America and Radio Farda has been destroyed by Musk.

evilmonkey19• 6 months ago

Thank you!

selectively• 6 months ago

You are good.

lbhdc• 6 months ago

I know everyone has strong opinions about Elon, but for $10/mo I would absolutely get this. At $50/mo, I don't have enough of a need to get it.

coolspot2• 6 months ago

There is a ”secret” $10/month 10GB roam plan.

shimman6• 6 months ago

Don't worry, this is the type of project that can easily get nationalized with zero pushback if anyone with authority wanted to.

ahmeneeroe-v22• 6 months ago

yes but only by a US authority.

vardump3• 6 months ago

That might have pretty negative long time consequences. Nationalize a few companies and soon the corporates might relocate.

talkingtab2• 6 months ago

This resonates for me.

I do not want my technology tied to some person I consider of despicable character. Would I buy a cell phone, even at a good deal from Putin? No. Corporations have increasingly become political. Thanks, United vs FEC! So we see them taking a knee to gain commercial advantage. And as in this case harm to our democracy.

In my opinion, no discussion about Starlink is complete without considering whether the money you pay will be used to profit people or causes you do not want.

If you need this, then great. But I have other choices, just as I would not touch a tesla even if you gave it to me. I just am not that desperate.

denysvitali• 6 months ago

Apple is incorporated in California, USA. Does this mean that you're not buying iPhones either because you don't like Trump?

mattmaroon6• 6 months ago

I’m always amazed how much people attribute to citizens united, a ruling that overturned portions of a law that was only on the books for 7 years at the time.

GlacierFox• 6 months ago

Wait until you hear about what the early pioneers of the electronic device you're using right now used to think... And do.

You gonna throw your computer away?

PaulDavisThe1st4• 6 months ago

My concern is that man, not the many people who work in the corporations who make the computing devices that I use. It's not exactly that those corporations have an unblemished record, but compared to what that guy did during his brief utterly ruinous stint with DOGE and in his election support of that other guy, there isn't a computing device company that doesn't look like St Francis of Assissi.

dayyan4• 6 months ago

Noted, your principles are clearly priceless. The rest of us will just keep enjoying the world’s best mobile internet while you hold the line.

frogperson• 6 months ago

The more I learn about Musk's past, his family, his ties to the paypal mafia, the more I want absolutely nothing to do with him.

Him or any of his companies will never see a penny from me.

behnamoh4• 6 months ago

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

scottyah2• 6 months 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.

olyjohn8• 6 months ago

[delayed]

gregsadetsky4• 6 months 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

CyberDildonics• 6 months ago

This doesn't seem to have anything to do with the current advertisement being discussed.

gregsadetsky4• 6 months 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• 6 months ago

Not just you, that might be a overall record for bsky?

anewhnaccount2• 6 months ago

There is something like this but twice the prive in Finland 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.

ac292• 6 months ago

Embeddedworks sells unlimited 750kbps service for $90/year. Its data only, no phone or SMS.

When I talked to them earlier this year they said there was potential to sell other data rates though nothing was as low as $2/month.

gregsadetsky4• 6 months ago

Unfortunately their plan is an IoT plan “Not Intended for Phones or Tablets” [0]

That’s exactly the issue - it’s a great plan, it’s just contractually stopped from being offered because a lot of people would potentially switch to that..! :)

To me, the fact that the restriction exists is a proof of the demand for this.

[0] https://embeddedworks.net/product/wsim0331-sub/

kalleboo3• 6 months ago

In Japan you have consumer (with voice) plans for

Unlimited 32kbps $1.60/mo (I guess this makes more sense for IoT?)

Unlimited 300kbps $4/mo

Unlimited 1.5Mbps $6/mo

https://mineo.jp/price/#mysoku

gregsadetsky4• 6 months ago

Those are dreamy! But also, Japan has incredible density.

I was imagining a no-support, pure esim play. I mean. Even calling it brainstorming is an exaggeration haha

userbinator3• 6 months ago

"unlimited", or basically ~80GB/month if you saturate it 24/7 as users are likely to.

mikestew6• 6 months 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• 6 months 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.

mikestew6• 6 months 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.

jamieatlason• 6 months ago

The residential plan can't be used with the Starlink mini, only the full size Starlink. At least that's the case in the US. Cheapest plan is now $165 for users that need over 100GB.

I still think this is mostly a positive change, but it is a bummer that the service plans keep changing.

_blk2• 6 months 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

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.

ralfd2• 6 months ago

Can one downgrade back from unlimited too 100?

_blk2• 6 months 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.

mattmaroon6• 6 months 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.

lta4• 6 months 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• 6 months 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.

hinkley2• 6 months 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.

o_1• 6 months ago

something something, sounds like a bluesky post.

dayyan4• 6 months ago

Boycott noted, meanwhile, I’ll be enjoying double the roaming data while you wait for that legendary ‘neutral’ competitor to beam down from the heavens.

drivingmenuts• 6 months ago

Hey, at least they won't be getting data from and enriching an avowed racist, so they got that going for them.

Enjoy your part in creating misery for people who just happen to not be white.

lta4• 6 months ago

I live and work from a van part of the year and am perfectly fine with a 4g router almost anywhere save some mountain climbing spot, so there's really no need for me. I pay about 30€ and get about 250GB when in France and 30GB whenever I enter a new country so I'm not lacking considering my usage, but thank you

homebrewer2• 6 months ago

I think they will have enough clients from other parts of the world to make it work. Large areas of my country can't really be covered with wired networks, it's too expensive to make it economically feasible without massive government subsidies, for which there's no money.

Starlink has already been used to connect very remote rural schools which previously only had dial-up connectivity (enough to send text email, but not much else).

And nobody here cares about American politics, we have enough of our own problems.

izzydata• 6 months ago

It's not really American politics when Elon decides to turn off your countries internet for personal gain. Having such critical infrastructure in the hands of someone unstable wouldn't be a choice I ever make for something so important.

ingenieros2• 6 months ago

USAID was ironically a significant customer for Starlink. People are probably already familiar with the 5,000 Ukraine terminal scandal, but pretty much all their offices (in Colombia at least) had 1 or more terminals. What does USAID have anything to do with this conversation? Well, DOGE was largely responsible for putting the final nail on that coffin. If you think he cares about remote rural schools having connectivity you better think again.

taytus2• 6 months ago

It’s not “American politics” when a guy does a Nazi salute on live TV. So thanks for showing your political inclination.

whimsicalism5• 6 months ago

thank you for not bidding up the price

gordonhart• 6 months ago

Would you rather buy from Jeff Bezos or a Chinese state-owned enterprise? Those are your likely options within the next 5-10 years.

whimsicalism5• 6 months ago

Does Jeff Bezos believe we need white solidarity to survive because non-white people are a threat to white men?

bborud• 6 months ago

In 20026 that’s a question I would have to answer with «I’ll have to get back to you on that».

In fact, sometimes I wish I had chosen a profession where I didn’t need an internet connection at all.

mrguyorama• 6 months ago

Nobody has been forced to switch to a space based internet solution.

You don't need to buy from any of those people.

ibejoeb2• 6 months ago

See also the "Fuck You Elon" exhibit at this past Burning Man, powered by starlink.

Salgat2• 6 months ago

I respect your principles, but at the same time, using Starlink for now does encourage other potential competitors to come forth, at which time you could switch.

dyauspitr2• 6 months ago

There are two Chinese alternatives being deployed right now. I believe one is called Guowang. As a red blooded American, I would rather go with Guowang over an American Nazi.

iloveitaly• 6 months ago

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

lateforwork• 6 months ago

Absolutely monopoly? You mean other than Kuiper, right?

https://www.aboutamazon.com/news/innovation-at-amazon/what-i...

mikeyouse• 6 months ago

How many customers does Kuiper have at present?

spullara• 6 months ago

that entire page is in future tense

IncreasePosts2• 6 months ago

Makes sense. Make your service good enough with your rocket+satellite synergy that competitors would need to spend $500B to be competitive.

bluGill• 6 months 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.

carlosjobim2• 6 months ago

Satellite internet's main selling point is for use in remote locations.

dayyan4• 6 months ago

That's the magic of the free market. Even with no direct rival yet, Starlink innovates like crazy because the threat of competition is always there and consumers demand excellence. Unlike state-granted monopolies, those parasitic structures stagnate and plunder the people.

typon• 6 months ago

Is this why Google Search has been getting better and better every year?

ks20482• 6 months ago

"Enshittification" would suggest otherwise.

dpedu• 6 months ago

Some lessons were learned from iRobot.

daemonologist• 6 months ago

I assume they want to attract as many customers has possible while they have that monopoly - eventually they're going to need to compete with Amazon (Leo) and China (Qianfan, although I assume it'll be banned in the US). The cost of the phased-array terminals probably means there will be some stickiness.

Also as has been noted, in some markets they do compete on price: https://restofworld.org/2025/starlink-cheaper-internet-afric...

ahepp• 6 months ago

I've never read Peter Thiel's books, but isn't that kinda a part of his playbook? Monopolies, but driving progress? "Competition is for losers"? I never fully understood it because it seems like then you're just competing with yourself.

inemesitaffia4• 6 months ago

Blue Ocean Strategy.

ks20482• 6 months ago

I would guess that for many of their customers, they are still competing with non-satellite internet.

kortilla3• 6 months ago

They have a monopoly on sat-only market, but that isn’t really big enough of a market to support their growth goals. They want to eat all wireless providers Internet as well.

fguerraz• 6 months ago

They have an absolute monopoly on a very niche market in developed countries. 5G beats satellite in both speed and convenience IMHO.

It's a completely different story in countries with crappy networks (looking at you Philippines), remote areas, or offshore.

HumblyTossed• 6 months 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.

ibejoeb2• 6 months 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• 6 months ago

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

porkloin• 6 months 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/

shibapuppie3• 6 months 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.

olyjohn8• 6 months ago

If you have distinct spikes, you might have an obstruction. You need a much larger view of the sky to the north to completely get rid of that. If the connection is perfect, you should get consistent 20ms pings all day long. But it is really difficult to do, especially when traveling and you don't have control of where you can actually put the dish.

olyjohn8• 6 months ago

20ms pings, and I'm on the original gen 1 dish from the beta days still. Can't really tell much difference from a land-based connection. The mini is even faster when it has an equivalent view of the sky.

LorenDB• 6 months ago

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

whimsicalism5• 6 months 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

film42• 6 months 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?

stickfigure2• 6 months ago

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

ost-ing• 6 months 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.

dayyan4• 6 months ago

Thanks for letting us all know. We needed to hear that. /s

kiwijamo3• 6 months 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• 6 months 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• 6 months ago

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

huydotnet2• 6 months 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• 6 months ago

I believe there is a rule where the HN title should mirror the article’s title

galkk• 6 months ago

Yes, this is weird title change.

_vqpz• 6 months 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• 6 months 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• 6 months 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

nine_k• 6 months 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.

Dylan168075• 6 months ago

They changed two things and the title only has one of the things, so personally I think that's 'misleading' enough to append the rest.

huydotnet2• 6 months ago

I think this is one of the cases where strictly applying the guideline fails the reader, but yeah, I can see that this guideline make sense most of the (other) cases.

numpad0• 6 months ago

If I were to guess, probably because Musk achieved self-fulfilling prophecy of hate and discriminatory handling against him, and now any obviously him related content gets massive, organic, figurative, score penalties.

Tesla and SpaceX posts used to routinely hit the top spots and accumulate thousands of comments here, now they hardly stay an hour on the first page. Someone on the Internet's first headphone amp is now considered more important to people here than the world's largest rocket flying, if that comes with Musk attached.

Obviously as anybody knows, that's how `hate` actually works: silent exclusion, not posturing. But that was what they advocated for years, so, here's my slow claps...

apitman• 6 months 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• 6 months 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• 6 months 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.

arjie3• 6 months 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• 6 months 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• 6 months ago

Oh lord. Sorry they’re doing that to you. Chargeback?

inemesitaffia4• 6 months ago

There's a phone number. Ask or search the Starlink subreddit.

Failing that call your national Telecoms regulator

tintor• 6 months ago

What is advantage of Starlink Residental over Roam?

inemesitaffia4• 6 months ago

Better QOS/QCI

rootusrootus3• 6 months 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.

Roam 50GB is now Roam 100GB

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