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Musk shakes up SpaceX in race to make satellite launch window: sources

reuters.com

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Re: Musk shakes up SpaceX in race to make satellite launch window: sources

#51

Post by pjc50 »

murukesh_s wrote: post #40
nemo44x wrote: post #12

I'm amazed how little coverage Starlink, OneWeb, etc get. It's the next revolution and the most important tech since the smart phone. Think about the great firewall of China. It's dead after this. Having a cell provider and home internet provider. Gone. Poor bandwidth anywhere on Earth - a thing of the past. This is important and huge. Buy rural property that is undeveloped. In 10 years time you'll be able to power i…

> Buy rural property that is undeveloped Wish it was that simple. Maybe when there is a big enough community (then it would get expensive isn't it). I once wished for that but after getting married the priorities change 1) kids schooling 2) ours and kids social life 3) medical emergencies 4) window shopping and cheese burgers dammit :) I think we the average folks are enslaved

Yes, the "getting away from it all" is a weird kind of fantasy; I don't know why a satellite would suddenly enable it.

> A self driving carriage will deliver whatever goods you need the same day.

Rural areas are going to be the last places for full driverless, surely? Badly paved or gravel roads with zero markings? Higher chance of animals in the road? Poor metadata or lack of postal codes?

Re: Musk shakes up SpaceX in race to make satellite launch window: sources

#52

Post by nickik »

shaklee3 wrote: post #30
nemo44x wrote: post #12

I'm amazed how little coverage Starlink, OneWeb, etc get. It's the next revolution and the most important tech since the smart phone. Think about the great firewall of China. It's dead after this. Having a cell provider and home internet provider. Gone. Poor bandwidth anywhere on Earth - a thing of the past. This is important and huge. Buy rural property that is undeveloped. In 10 years time you'll be able to power i…

Even for people in this industry that follow the news, you're right. I see hardly anything about it. However, there are a few really good analysts on Twitter that talk about it, and the consensus seems to be that starlink is in trouble. Between taking debt and the questionable status of the satellites that were launched, it seems it needs to be written about more.

Well, making debt is not a problem. Its inevitable. We are talking about a new mass production facility for satellites.

I have also read many people that SpaceX tech is ahead of everybody else in a number of areas. Not to mention that they can launch way cheaper then everybody else.

There were claims that they had propulsion problems and that might be true but we don't really know.

Re: Musk shakes up SpaceX in race to make satellite launch window: sources

#53

Post by mmjaa »

CamperBob2 wrote: post #4

I like the quote about putting Comcast out of business, but I don't know that I would have said as much publicly.

What on earth do you mean? Everyone online, i.e. in the general public, hates on Comcast.

Disclaimer: Never been a customer. Started my own ISP's instead.

Re: Musk shakes up SpaceX in race to make satellite launch window: sources

#54

Post by mmjaa »

jccooper wrote: post #39
StillBored wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It might not be comcast that dies, but rather a couple of the cell phone vendors. Those are the businesses that are making bank on what is basically low bandwidth wide area coverage. Given the transmission path is going to be going up, it seems that a lot of the existing problems with topology and buildings getting it the way will be reduced. Anyway, I'm in a town with google fiber, but can't get more than a 30Mbit u…

Starlink service will not compete with cell phones; the terminals are too large. If anything, it will complement cell service, by making tower backhaul easier. It's also unlikely to directly compete with wired ISPs in cities, as the bandwidth required for everyone to have a terminal would be high. But it could enable unwired 5G stations as micro-ISPs, which would be a similar effect. What it will kill are rural or un…

All of the above is positive, in my opinion. As long as the Starlink sats somehow, eventually, fall out of corporate hands. I mean, such infinite power...

Re: Musk shakes up SpaceX in race to make satellite launch window: sources

#55

Post by lorenzhs »

jccooper wrote: post #37
bathMarm0t wrote: post #21

Maybe this is an obvious question, but is spacex allowed to bump / not take orders from its opponents in favor of its own internet satellites? That would effectively force any competitor to launch with someone more expensive, allowing spacex to corner the space-internet market on cost, right?

SpaceX can fly--or not--whomever they want. And they are, in fact, not flying their competitors. OneWeb is booked on a variety of SpaceX competitors: Arianespace (mostly Soyuz, but also optionally Ariane 6), Virgin, and Blue Origin. SpaceX certainly hopes this gives them an advantage, and it probably does, though eventually someone is bound to copy them if they prove successful. Blue Origin is already well on their w…

Soyuz is Roscosmos, not Arianespace. Maybe you meant Vega? But that’s a much smaller launcher.

Re: Musk shakes up SpaceX in race to make satellite launch window: sources

#56

Post by nickik »

walrus01 wrote: post #42
shaklee3 wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are a lot of "has not been done before" going on right now in the satellite industry. Musk is the only one getting press, though. And keep in mind that the cpe cost hasn't been justified anywhere I've seen. Phased array is still far from $700, so it's not clear how they plan to recoup that.

Yes I am also highly skeptical of what the CPE cost will be. Starlink has been over hyped in the non-satellite-industry technology press as if it will be a panacea for residential, rural internet access and for small business. But I'm thinking the rooftop terminal cost might be more like $3000-5000 of hardware, not totally outside the realm of possibility to recoup the cost for on 36 month contracts, but not somethin…

> $3000-5000 of hardware

How do you get to that?

The will mass produce these themselves seems highly unlikely that they would be so expensive.

Re: Musk shakes up SpaceX in race to make satellite launch window: sources

#57

Post by walrus01 »

nickik wrote: post #56
walrus01 wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes I am also highly skeptical of what the CPE cost will be. Starlink has been over hyped in the non-satellite-industry technology press as if it will be a panacea for residential, rural internet access and for small business. But I'm thinking the rooftop terminal cost might be more like $3000-5000 of hardware, not totally outside the realm of possibility to recoup the cost for on 36 month contracts, but not somethin…

> $3000-5000 of hardware How do you get to that? The will mass produce these themselves seems highly unlikely that they would be so expensive.

I'm basing it on my knowledge of all comparable two way satellite antennas, Rx/tx rf chains and modems. But there really is nothing comparable. The cost may end up being opaque and hidden to the end user wrapped up in 24, 36, 60 month service contracts. Sort of like how you can get a $950 phone for "$0" with contract.

Current phased array two way satellite stuff that is small, and intended for geostationary purposes, is manufactured in such small quantities that it is hard to compare.

Re: Musk shakes up SpaceX in race to make satellite launch window: sources

#58

Post by xoa »

gpm wrote: post #22
hendry wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Good bandwidth and terrible latency is satellite Internet

Starlink, not having the speed of light slowed down by fibre, should have lower latency over long distances. 26ms lower from new York to London (total 50ms). Past instances of this sort of speedup have shown that this is worth billions to high frequency traders... Reddit post that includes includes links to the academic paper that latency number is coming from, and lots of other useful information: https://www.reddit…

This shouldn't be down voted. While photonic-bandgap fiber can approach speed of light in a vacuum (to ~99.7%) it is not commercially deployed in any volume AFAIK, and standard fiber propagates signal at only about 70% of vacuum. Starlink will of course involve a minimum fixed distance penalty of a few hundred kilometers on each leg and some amount of inherent constellation bounce penalty each sat. Even so over distances of a couple thousand kilometers or more having the signal go near maximum (even up/down, air is not vacuum but with an index of refraction of only 1.0003 is damn close) vs 70% actually looks to be quite significant. I see no reason while standard fiber couldn't be beaten even under optimal point-to-point conditions (like NY to London, around 5500 km) if they were able to get it up fast enough in the near term.

And that's point-to-point from an HFT viewpoint, whereas of course in most situations fiber will not be even close to taking a direct route between locations. Even if photonic-bandgap fiber got deployed for transoceanic or continental backbone links Starlink could still of competitive practical latencies if the satellites are orbiting low enough and impose a low enough overhead.

Re: Musk shakes up SpaceX in race to make satellite launch window: sources

#59

Post by TeMPOraL »

pjc50 wrote: post #51
murukesh_s wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Buy rural property that is undeveloped Wish it was that simple. Maybe when there is a big enough community (then it would get expensive isn't it). I once wished for that but after getting married the priorities change 1) kids schooling 2) ours and kids social life 3) medical emergencies 4) window shopping and cheese burgers dammit :) I think we the average folks are enslaved

Yes, the "getting away from it all" is a weird kind of fantasy; I don't know why a satellite would suddenly enable it. > A self driving carriage will deliver whatever goods you need the same day. Rural areas are going to be the last places for full driverless, surely? Badly paved or gravel roads with zero markings? Higher chance of animals in the road? Poor metadata or lack of postal codes?

Also very population density, making it less attractive relative to e.g. suburbs.

Re: Musk shakes up SpaceX in race to make satellite launch window: sources

#60

Post by restalis »

Animats wrote: post #43

How'd that approach of firing the people who said it wasn't going to happen that fast work out at Tesla?

This is the context in which companies end up with slick players who's primary skill is to reframe the metrics and sell the idea of progress regardless of what's going on in reality.
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