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Live Starlink Satellite and Coverage Map

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Re: Live Starlink Satellite and Coverage Map

#51
post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geostationary_orbit

I thought the same, but they're actually below geostationary orbit. They have 12 hour orbits. Also, they don't orbit the equator, which is required for a geostationary orbit. See my comment above with more details.

I think this article, that most here have probably read or heard about considering how popular it was on HN, explains why quite well! It is a very long article though (which is awesome, imo!). The whole thing is an incredible primer on GPS .

Re: Live Starlink Satellite and Coverage Map

#52
post #21

There's a bunch of Starlink coverage maps like this; the most useful one (IMHO) is Mike Puchol's at https://starlink.sx/ The nice thing about that Mike's is you can see exactly where you are in relation to nearby satellites and base stations. And get a pretty good guess as to where your packets are going to go. It is all guesswork - SpaceX only shares what they are required to by the FCC. But it's been pretty accurat…

The big problem with this one appears to be that it doesn’t load.

It loaded after about 5 mins for me, but runs extremely slow still, and seems less intuitive than the OP.

Re: Live Starlink Satellite and Coverage Map

#53

I did something similar for my SpaceX interview: Website: https://threejs-earth-satellites.vercel.app/05_equatorial_pl... Github: https://github.com/amir734jj/threejs-earth-satellites Beam Planner: https://github.com/amir734jj/beam-planner

Pretty neat - did you get the job?

Re: Live Starlink Satellite and Coverage Map

#55

I did something similar for my SpaceX interview: Website: https://threejs-earth-satellites.vercel.app/05_equatorial_pl... Github: https://github.com/amir734jj/threejs-earth-satellites Beam Planner: https://github.com/amir734jj/beam-planner

Pretty neat - did you get the job?

I didn't like the company culture but loved the engineering behind the scene. Awesome company.

Re: Live Starlink Satellite and Coverage Map

#56
post #31

Alaska isn’t in the mesh, how is it in the coverage zone?

They have a certain number of near-polar orbit satellites. There's not yet the same level of coverage as inside 57 degrees, but they do have ground stations and offer coverage, though it seems to be of the "just barely" sort. The polar orbits are rapidly filling in, however, so it should get better before too long.

Re: Live Starlink Satellite and Coverage Map

#57
post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This service is not for you if that is your reaction. Until recently I lived in a location where there is literally no other option capable of supporting Teams calls. Before Starlink I rented a second house in a "nearby" (49 minutes each way) town to use as an office. Comparatively, Starlink is a phenomenal deal.

What does competition look like for Starlink? Will competitors have to launch their own mesh of satellites? If you want to actually have your own IPv4 address you will have to pay $250 per month + $2500 for the terminal. This is despite the fact an IPv4 address only costs them a one time cost of about $40.

I think the closest they have to a competitor is oneweb, which hasn't completed the roll out for their first constellation yet. They are surprisingly close though, and could've been able to actually have an operational internet service if it wasn't for a scrapped launch related to the Russian invasion.

I remember thinking they were basically dead, but they have recovered surprisingly well. Though their satellites are more likely to remain in space since they don't deorbit as easily as starlink. Otherwise the "traditional" satellite internet providers don't really even count as actual competitors.

Also, I thought starlink didn't provide customers with IP addresses and that the whole thing was going through a CGNAT and the sats themselves used private internal addresses. Even starlink business users don't get a static IP, just a publically addressable one through DHCP that could in theory change at any time more or less. That means that the premium is most probably due to the added complexity that comes with making some of their network publically addressable rather than having anything to do with IPv4 costs. From what I'm reading they also seem to be working on ipv6 support (soon™), which is hopefully going to make IPv4 pricing matter a lot less for users. Until then they are probably limited by their CGNAT architecture.

I'll look it up since it could've been just some launch date speculation.

Re: Live Starlink Satellite and Coverage Map

#59
post #26
post #3

As impressive as the number of Starlink satellites is, the service has become unusable for me in Southern California, particularly for video calls. I’ve been told that the bottleneck is land stations, not satellites. Either way, I’ve had to cancel my Starlink service both at home and work.

It's not really a service meant for SoCal, but I'm sure they see it as a valuable stress test.

Every time Starlink comes up it’s the same argument. “It’s not meant for high population density areas”

Without the “high population density areas” it is simply not economically viable

Re: Live Starlink Satellite and Coverage Map

#60
post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This service is not for you if that is your reaction. Until recently I lived in a location where there is literally no other option capable of supporting Teams calls. Before Starlink I rented a second house in a "nearby" (49 minutes each way) town to use as an office. Comparatively, Starlink is a phenomenal deal.

What does competition look like for Starlink? Will competitors have to launch their own mesh of satellites? If you want to actually have your own IPv4 address you will have to pay $250 per month + $2500 for the terminal. This is despite the fact an IPv4 address only costs them a one time cost of about $40.

For a slight latency cost, you could always VPN to an endpoint in the cloud with a routable IP address.
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