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With latency as low as 25ms, SpaceX to launch broadband satellites in 2019

arstechnica.com

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Re: With latency as low as 25ms, SpaceX to launch broadband satellites in 2019

#151

Post by alkonaut »

rhino369 wrote: post #140
alkonaut wrote: post #115

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I assume the sensitity to weather etc depends on the type of equipment you have? Couldn't a community use a huge high power and high sensitivity common receiver/transmitter station, that provides fiber to 10-1000 households? The community station could also provide some kind of limited bandwidth fallback such as DSL or LTE that just ensures peoples fiber lines limp along when the satellites can't be reached (so their…

The cost of fiber is mostly the cost of hooking up homes. Once you have that, the cost of running a connection to a telecom is cheap comparatively.

I think that's true in places like (large parts of) the US where the "last mile problem" exists. However for lots of rural Africa, China, Australia there surely must also exist a "first 1000miles problem".

Re: With latency as low as 25ms, SpaceX to launch broadband satellites in 2019

#152

Post by deno »

candiodari wrote: post #128

Interesting. What would this be able to do ? Current wireless speeds, even with state of the art technology, is going to be something like 10Gbit. That'll have to be shared by an entire city at least (correction: about 2 satellites per state on average. Less for New York), and of course there won't be any CDNs or HTTP caches "upstairs" so to speak. So 1 bit in = 1 bit back out. Even at 4425 satellites that means, let…

> and of course there won't be any CDNs or HTTP caches "upstairs" so to speak.

I wonder what will be the marketing buzzword for the first datacenter in space…

Re: With latency as low as 25ms, SpaceX to launch broadband satellites in 2019

#153

Post by c22 »

tehwhynot wrote: post #52

Do the same thing on Mars. Then get self-driving space internet machines that transfer internet from here to Mars. They always position themselves to be between here and Mars for best RTT. Thank me later, humanity. And yeah, I know latency would be between 6 and ~45 minutes.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Interplanetary_Internet

https://www.nasa.gov/feature/goddard/2017/nasa-taking-first-...

Re: With latency as low as 25ms, SpaceX to launch broadband satellites in 2019

#154

Post by jacobush »

viraptor wrote: post #126
jacobush wrote: post #118

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Say hello to ultra-fine real-time triangulation of your position. Of course privacy protected with the same care and zeal that protects your Tesla.

It's not going to be better than GPS/GLONAS. If there is a specific location component in the ground stations, it will be known pretty soon. Otherwise, the location will be very weather dependent. If you have a phone with you, you're likely providing a better location to Google/Apple right now.

Of course. But they will be another cell phone like actor, only global.

Re: With latency as low as 25ms, SpaceX to launch broadband satellites in 2019

#155

Post by modeless »

shaklee3 wrote: post #130
modeless wrote: post #45

Shorter summary of SpaceX's Senate testimony https://www.commerce.senate.gov/public/_cache/files/6c08b6c2... : Initially, the SpaceX system will consist of 4,425 satellites operating in 83 orbital planes (at altitudes ranging from 1,110 km to 1,325 km). SpaceX has proposed an additional constellation of 7,500 satellites operating even closer to Earth. For the end consumer, SpaceX user terminals—essentially, a relativ…

Where do you see anything about the antenna size? All I've seen is that this will be for Enterprise customers, and the antenna will be very large. By the way, a very small phased array will be very low gain, thus using more capacity on their satellite for the same speeds. Unless they've invented a new type of antenna...

It's a verbatim quote from the link in my post.

Re: With latency as low as 25ms, SpaceX to launch broadband satellites in 2019

#156

Post by TeMPOraL »

davrosthedalek wrote: post #142
seiferteric wrote: post #132

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's my point, if you have high gain in a particular direction, wouldn't interference coming from a different direction be mostly rejected? The point being, this could offer internet to people in repressed countries that can't practically be blocked or tampered with. If they coupled this with a free tier with low bandwidth it could be huge, assuming people could smuggle in the equipment to make it work.

Not an expert, but here is my take: A phased array consists of many individual, non-directional antennas. The directionality comes by cleverly combining the signal of the antennas. If there is a jamming signal, all antennas would receive it. In theory, it would then cancel out when the signals are combined. The question is now: Before the signal is combined, is there any element which can be saturated by the large ja…

That was exactly my line of thinking, but I know very little of RF engineering.

Re: With latency as low as 25ms, SpaceX to launch broadband satellites in 2019

#157

Post by pogo »

noonespecial wrote: post #18
mattcoles wrote: post #6

Do we have space in orbit for this? This is a lot of satellites and I also don't get how the latency can be so much lower than current satellite ISPs?

1) Space is huge. This is a little like asking if there's enough space left in earths oceans to float a few thousand pingpong balls. 2) Present internet satellites are all in mostly geostationary orbits that are much further away then the proposed leo's. Realistically the ones we have now introduce a whopping 650ms. This will be a huge improvement.

No, collisions are a very real risk. In fact, they've already happened. In 2009, an Iridium satellite accidentally collided with a Russian satellite. Space-X is talking about quadrupling the number of existing satellites, so collisions will be more likely and the resulting debris increases the chances of subsequent collisions much more. This escalating effect is know as Kessler Syndrome (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kessler_syndrome).

Re: With latency as low as 25ms, SpaceX to launch broadband satellites in 2019

#158

Post by artursapek »

deegles wrote: post #27
artursapek wrote: post #19

Oh how I wish I could buy SpaceX stock...

I'm seriously considering getting a job there someday for this this reason. (but mostly because Mars)

I once got a recruiting email from them, but when I looked later the guy was in prison. He was the "Silk Road 2" guy. So now I don't have any contacts there :(

Re: With latency as low as 25ms, SpaceX to launch broadband satellites in 2019

#159

Post by vkou »

donkeyd wrote: post #144
rsync wrote: post #129

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Musk himself has stated the goal is to make money to help pay for colonizing Mars." Which I continue to misunderstand ... You can go to Mars ... you can have an outpost on Mars ... you can have scientists and tourists and so on go back and forth to Mars - all very positive and exciting. But you can't live on Mars for an extended period because the gravity is 1/3 of earths. Your teeth will decay. Your bones will weak…

> I fail to see how one could actually live on Mars without sacrificing 30 or more years of lifespan. Maybe they just cant can't, but don't care. Some people could be willing to decrease their lifespan in order to colonize a different planet, making the human race interplanetary. Also, theoretically, people will evolve over time to be able to handle those conditions. We're used to making plans a couple years ahead. W…

Evolution happens over many generations, if people who are less fit for survival die before, or are prevented from reproducing.

You don't want to go down that road.

Re: With latency as low as 25ms, SpaceX to launch broadband satellites in 2019

#160

Post by alasdair_ »

chii wrote: post #121
TeMPOraL wrote: post #112

Earlier quoted context omitted.

OTOH one country enabling communication infrastructure to another country's citizens without approval of their government would be rightly considered as violation of national sovereignty and could presumably be seen as an act of war.

But its the citizen of the country who initiated the communication, and the act of providing a service cannot be made as an excuse for war. At best, the citizen get prosecuted for illegal communication.

Anything can be used as an excuse for war.

You really think North Korea wouldn't damage a satellite giving its citizens open internet access if it had the ability to do so?

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