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Existing smartphones will connect with new satellite constellations in 2023

spectrum.ieee.org

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

#221

Post by denlekke »

kortilla wrote: post #139
hughes wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is mentioned in the article. > Splashy announcements of satellite-cellular connectivity from Apple, Starlink, and T-Mobile in the third quarter of 2022 promoted the idea of anywhere, any-kind connectivity.

But the one from Apple is a joke compared to general sms and mms coverage. Or is apple’s system capable of much more and the first beta is just “SOS”?

TMobile/SpaceX proposed service does sound better than the one Apple currently provides. Apple's works right now though and T/S's doesn't which is a notable difference. I also haven't read anything about the T/S service that says they will exclude iPhones. As an iPhone user, I would love to have access to both services! It's unlikely I would switch to a different phone manufacturer to get access to this service if it isn't available to iphones, but i might switch to TMobile from my current mvno to get it on iphone.

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

#222

Post by cldellow »

paraselene_ wrote: post #178
cldellow wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Man, as a Canadian, I hate being put in the position of defending our wireless monopolies. But here goes. That website seems... not great? I think you got a 50x ratio by dividing the average prices of $0.12 (Italy) and $5.94 (Canada). That appears to be a median...but I'd like to know how they chose the plans they used for the calculation. For example, Canada's maximum price is given as $46.02/GB. Perhaps such a plan…

I'll pitch in my celluar plan for comparison (Taipei) Currently I'm paying around US$16/mo for unlimited LTE data with a major celluar provider here, and have been doing so for the past 4-5 years. (no, not unlimited with throttled cap, and with hotspot included) And with recent 5G plans, unlimited plans (with 50GBs of unthrottled hotspot) can be had for effectively less than $30 a month, or even lower if you consider…

Oh, yeah, NA's plans are expensive, no argument there. Just not 50x more expensive.

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

#223

Post by snotrockets »

onethought wrote: post #152
snotrockets wrote: post #121

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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

But pretending Elon is deserving of this attention is just lazy journalism… like he’s screaming from a megaphone what he’s doing… and journalists aren’t even looking at other billionaires/space companies/car companies that are up to worse activity than anything Elon is responsible for. (I’m not saying it excuses it, but it’s wasted attention)

He, and his companies deserve every bit of attention. You could argue others deserve just as much (and I'd agree). But no harm in exposing him for being a bigoted man-child, who control unproportional amount of wealth.

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

#224

Post by RC_ITR »

jojobas wrote: post #15
RC_ITR wrote: post #2

Just as a PSA in case not everyone knows this new feature. In the US and a growing number of other countries, the latest iPhones have a satellite network for emergencies. If tech giants are going to spend money on something cool, might as well use it. https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT213426

It's not exactly "satellite network", it's piggy-backing on an existing SAR reception infrastructure that used to require somewhat expensive dedicated devices. Not sure it's a good idea, I'd expect a wave of SAR requests for not real emergencies.

Idk where you’re getting your info, but they’re globestar satellites and Apple invested half a billion dollars into that company.

https://www.apple.com/newsroom/2022/11/emergency-sos-via-sat...

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

#226

Post by cpncrunch »

jychang wrote: post #65
cpncrunch wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are affordable plans in Canada. It's just that they aren't really advertised. I have unlimited Canadian talk+text + 2GB for $35/month. Without the data (just unlimited domestic text+voice) it's $20/month. This plan isn't public...for some reason my wife got emailed about it and she got signed up. They allowed me to sign up too, even though they hadn't notified me about it. I think these plans are used to entice…

In the USA, unlimited talk/text with 2GB data is $14/month with Tello. $8/month without data. $29/month with unlimited data.

Yes, I'm not defending Canada's high rates. It does indeed have much higher data rates than anywhere else, as can be seen on the BNEsim rates for various countries. I was just pointing out that you can get much cheaper rates than the advertised plans if you dig a little.

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

#227

Post by TheSpiceIsLife »

rolenthedeep wrote: post #30

Huh, I wonder how they manage to pick up the tiny amount of RF energy a normal phone can output from that far away, and through the noise of literally millions of other phones in the satellite's field of view. Gotta be some real weird RF voodoo happening in there.

Can we still detect the Voyager probe signals?

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

#228

Post by kortilla »

mschuster91 wrote: post #188
kortilla wrote: post #139

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But the one from Apple is a joke compared to general sms and mms coverage. Or is apple’s system capable of much more and the first beta is just “SOS”?

Apple's stuff is probably orders of magnitude more reliable, the system they use has been battle-tested for decades. Both Starlink's sat-cells and Apple's Globalstar link will be a real benefit for people who get stuck in a bad situation unprepared, but if I were a serious rock climber or similar, I'd still prefer a full-scale Globalstar, Iridium terminal or EPIRB device, then an iPhone with Globalstar, and only then…

Globalstar with an iPhone is not battletested at all. A huge chunk of the complexity of a sat system is in the ground side and the iPhone form factor is new.

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

#229

Post by lormayna »

snovv_crash wrote: post #173
lormayna wrote: post #168

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> LoRa LoRa bitrate is very low and the range of LoRa is not even comparable with satellite communication. Moreover, normal smartphone are not LoRa compatible.

Sattelite is 500km LoS, this is well in the capabilities of LORA. Text messages are also a similar bitrate to LORA.

https://lora-developers.semtech.com/documentation/tech-paper...

> LoRa provides for long-range communications: up to three miles (five kilometers) in urban areas, and up to 10 miles (15 kilometers) or more in rural areas (line of sight)

500km is one magnitude order more than the supposed range. And no phone has a LoRa chipset inside, neither the new ones.

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

#230

Post by snovv_crash »

lormayna wrote: post #229
snovv_crash wrote: post #173

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sattelite is 500km LoS, this is well in the capabilities of LORA. Text messages are also a similar bitrate to LORA.

https://lora-developers.semtech.com/documentation/tech-paper... > LoRa provides for long-range communications: up to three miles (five kilometers) in urban areas, and up to 10 miles (15 kilometers) or more in rural areas (line of sight) 500km is one magnitude order more than the supposed range. And no phone has a LoRa chipset inside, neither the new ones.

https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/abstract/document/9187602

The range limits are really around expected usage given omnidirectional antennas, unlicensed transmission power and terrestrial interference.

For LoS with a small (single) directional antenna it's easy to get another 10db. With a big dish you can go a lot higher.

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