Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Existing smartphones will connect with new satellite constellations in 2023

spectrum.ieee.org

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

121–130 of 233 posts

Re: Existing smartphones will connect with new satellite constellations in 2023

#121

Post by snotrockets »

onethought wrote: post #105
_hcuq wrote: post #104

Earlier quoted context omitted.

“Why has the world turned on Musk?”. You seriously don’t know? He behaves like a dick. In public. Maybe the other space companies and car companies are worse, but Musk flaunts his dickishness. They do it on the quiet, with PR companies to whitewash their actions. Just because he does it in public doesn’t make him less of a dick though. Just makes him a very easy target.

Bezos acts like a dick too. His space company is materially worse in every way. Amazon is famous for being a shitty place to work. We don’t even know what influence he has on the Washington Post, because he does it in secret. It’s weird you prefer it to be PR-whitewashed rather than just see it for what it is.

Not indulging one asshole does not mean you support the other one.

Re: Existing smartphones will connect with new satellite constellations in 2023

#122

Post by lyu07282 »

quest88 wrote: post #120
shasheene wrote: post #3

SpaceX and T-Mobile are starting a trial in late-2023 to use unmodified handsets for text (and later, voice and data) with the Starlink V2 network to remove cell coverage dead-zones. [1] [2] It's achieved by "dedicating a slice of T-Mobile's Mid-Band PCS [1.9 GHz] spectrum, to be integrated into Starlink satellites, launched next year", with each Starlink V2 satellite hosting two 5-6 meter long cell-spectrum antennas…

[flagged]

[flagged]

Re: Existing smartphones will connect with new satellite constellations in 2023

#123

Post by lormayna »

A mobile phone has a maximum power of 3W, the antenna is not directive and it's using frequencies in VHF bands. A Starlink satellite is orbiting at 400km.

As ham, I am seeing this communication very very difficult: even if it's LoS, mobile communications require high bitrates.

Re: Existing smartphones will connect with new satellite constellations in 2023

#124

Post by darkfirefly »

roywiggins wrote: post #98
BurningFrog wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Phones do receive data from GPS satellites.

I've run into the reverse misconception, people think they need cell service for GPS to work.

I often experience very slow time to fix with cell service off (& having location off beforehand) - I believe this is due to Assisted GNSS/GPS which significantly improves the time for GPS to start working (the associated Wikipedia article states that ~1 minute often without it, and worst case ~12.5 minutes)

Re: Existing smartphones will connect with new satellite constellations in 2023

#125

Post by rlt »

lyu07282 wrote: post #122
quest88 wrote: post #120

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

[flagged]

This is such a tired take. Strong leaders are able to marshal engineers to build things like the iPhone, electric cars, reusable rockets. Both Steve Jobs and Elon Musk excelled at this, and just because they're not doing the low level engineering work doesn't mean they don't get any credit.

And by all accounts Steve Jobs was extremely involved in the UX design of the original iPhone, and Elon Musk is often involved in engineering decisions at his companies.

That's not to say they both don't have flaws, but it's intellectually dishonest to deny their accomplishments because you don't like them.

Re: Existing smartphones will connect with new satellite constellations in 2023

#126

Post by Thlom »

cft wrote: post #5

I understand that a phone can receive a cellular signal from a satellite. But how can it transmit to a satellite given its limited transmission power (2-3 watts max)? Edit: googling my own question https://arstechnica.com/science/2021/09/a-virginia-company-h...

A VSAT terminal communicating with a geosynchronous satellite usually only use a 5Watt BUC (10W for higher bandwidth). These are of course mechanically pointed directly to the satellite, but the point being that you don’t need very high transmit power even when the target is 30000+ km up.

Re: Existing smartphones will connect with new satellite constellations in 2023

#127

Post by hericium »

onethought wrote: post #103
denlekke wrote: post #95

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Globalstar ... edit to add more detail: given Musk's history of unilaterally cancelling some individual's tesla orders, publishing car telemetry to dispute autopilot crash news stories, deciding when, how, and where Ukraine can use Starlink, and now plenty more examples of banning / censoring / downranking people as he sees fit on twitter, I'd prefer not to use a service he provides if i can get comparable capabiliti…

Can you provide details of the order cancellation? That’s a new one. Wasn’t the car telemetry only published because it went to court? Why are you upset with Musk when someone tries to defraud Tesla and they prove them wrong with data? No one else’s telemetry has been published. Meanwhile Uber have “god-mode” and can track every driver globally in realtime… and it was abused to stalk people. SpaceX donated starlinks…

> This super-villain narrative of Musk is hilariously comical. Where is it coming from?

For me it came from Musk downplaying COVID for financial gain.

Other than that, he's become proficient at discrediting himself as a reasonable, trustworthy person and presenting himself as a detached from reality lunatic who doesn't know when to stfu and how to behave.

When people like this have a lot (too much?) power that's when the super-villain vibe comes in.

Re: Existing smartphones will connect with new satellite constellations in 2023

#128

Post by ehsankia »

patentatt wrote: post #72
shasheene wrote: post #3

SpaceX and T-Mobile are starting a trial in late-2023 to use unmodified handsets for text (and later, voice and data) with the Starlink V2 network to remove cell coverage dead-zones. [1] [2] It's achieved by "dedicating a slice of T-Mobile's Mid-Band PCS [1.9 GHz] spectrum, to be integrated into Starlink satellites, launched next year", with each Starlink V2 satellite hosting two 5-6 meter long cell-spectrum antennas…

Does anyone know what codec they're using at 2kbps per voice call?

Probably not this but LyraV2 at 3.2kbps sounds super clean

https://opensource.googleblog.com/2022/09/lyra-v2-a-better-f...

Re: Existing smartphones will connect with new satellite constellations in 2023

#129

Post by 1123581321 »

shaklee3 wrote: post #113
1123581321 wrote: post #101

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Globalstar's network is LEO, but it's sparser (a couple dozen satellites) and about three times further away from earth.

it also uses a special antenna only in new iPhones that T-Mobile doesn't have the luxury of

They're nice, but shouldn't be needed. Ubiquitilink (mentioned as Lynk in the article) has proven 500km two-way connections without them. A large constellation at that height with large antennas and spectrum rights should be able to offer higher bandwidth service than Globalstar's current network offers to iPhones.

Globalstar's capabilities aren't frozen either. The Apple deal uses most of their capacity, but they'll be launching additional satellites. While they're not in the current deal, Globalstar could launch a lower LEO service in the future. Cell phones with bigger antennas, like the case antennas in the new iPhones, would have better sat service communicating at Starlink's range.

We're also in relatively early days of large antenna deployment. AST's record-setting antennas are going to look quaint as launch costs and more complicated deployments continue to advance and benefit every satellite network.

Re: Existing smartphones will connect with new satellite constellations in 2023

#130

Post by ipv6ipv4 »

ROTMetro wrote: post #118
ipv6ipv4 wrote: post #109

How is the Chinese government going to control the flow of information in China once all phones do this and traffic need not leave the Starlink network to allow communication between endpoints?

How are governments going to collect taxes once people use crypto across this for thier transactions?

The U.S. government still has jurisdiction over Starlink.

As for crypto currencies, they seem irrelevant to this topic.

Post reply on HN