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SpaceX, T-Mobile to connect satellites to cellphones in remote areas

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Re: SpaceX, T-Mobile to connect satellites to cellphones in remote areas

#471

Post by lxgr »

toomuchtodo wrote: post #61
joshuamoes wrote: post #42

This will shake up a lot of things in the sattelite market. It will take a lot of marketshare from satellite trackers like inreach. Also living in a remote area, and being familiar with the existing tracking solutions for transport this could be a lot cheaper per asset. Also remote sensor locations. Anything low bitrate.

Iridium in shambles.

It's going to be quite a while before Starlink and the other new solutions will be certified for safety of life, government/military use etc.

For example, Iridium only got GMDSS/SOLAS certified in 2020 – before that, Inmarsat was the only approved maritime (two-way) satellite safety provider for several decades.

Re: SpaceX, T-Mobile to connect satellites to cellphones in remote areas

#472

Post by Abishek_Muthian »

arbuge wrote: post #55

More detail here: https://www.cnbc.com/2022/08/25/spacex-and-t-mobile-team-up-... "T-Mobile users will be able to use messaging, MMS and certain messaging apps, from remote points across the lower 48 states, Alaska, Puerto Rico and Hawaii and even some remote points in the water. Eventually, the service will work with voice, Sievert said. T-Mobile plans to include the service in its most popular mobile plans but did…

> Musk said the service will work with Starlink’s second generation satellites, which have very large antennae and will be able to transmit directly to a cell or mobile phone.

This has far greater implications than dead zones, yacht's (or) Oil rigs; 'Telecommunication during natural disasters'!

With increasing number of extreme weather events, Our conventional telecommunication systems(especially base stations) cannot stand a chance against natural(man made?) disasters. Yet, Apart from few nerd group projects like disaster.radio I see no real work in building disaster resilient telecommunication network.

P.S. If you live in India, Especially in south-western India and are interested in https://disaster.radio project for your region then give me a ping. I've been trying to get it started for ages.

Re: SpaceX, T-Mobile to connect satellites to cellphones in remote areas

#473

Post by epgui »

assttoasstmgr wrote: post #442
epgui wrote: post #429

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It’s not fraud when you’re just over-optimistic, you believe what you’re saying, and you end up being wrong. It might suck, but it’s not fraud.

> It’s not fraud when you’re just over-optimistic, you believe what you’re saying, and you end up being wrong. "It's not a lie if you believe it." -- G. Costanza

Exactly. Doesn't mean it's great, but let's try and use the right words!

Re: SpaceX, T-Mobile to connect satellites to cellphones in remote areas

#474

Post by amiralul »

This service requires Starlink v2 satellites, which require Starship to fly to orbit (regularly). An orbital test of Starship should take place this year, but I wouldn’t be surprised if it’s pushed for next year. And there’s a long way from an orbital test to frequently launching Starships with Starlink v2 satellites.

Re: SpaceX, T-Mobile to connect satellites to cellphones in remote areas

#476

Post by KaiserPro »

speedgoose wrote: post #423
KaiserPro wrote: post #364

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My 2009 kia rio has FSD too, and like the tesla, it won't stop for children in FSD mode (note the FSD mode here is basically a brick on the accelerator)

If you think about the recent test conducted by a Tesla AI competitor, it wasn’t FSD mode. See https://electrek.co/2022/08/10/tesla-self-driving-smear-camp...

fair enough, thank you for sharing this.

Re: SpaceX, T-Mobile to connect satellites to cellphones in remote areas

#477

Post by elurg »

manquer wrote: post #441
mlindner wrote: post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why do people keep comparing to Theranos when Starlink is already being used by hundreds of thousands of people? Starlink exists. In fact, SpaceX/Starlink now operates more satellites in Low Earth Orbit than every other country and business in the world, combined. Theranos had no proven track record. Like, what's enough to satisfy you?

Minor pedantic observation Starlink will be able to claim that achievement of having more than everyone else combined soon but isn’t there yet. There are around 4000ish non starlink satellites in orbit today , starlink has 3k today .

I don't know where you're getting "4000ish non starlink satellites". This seems to be the current number at the start of the year inclusive of starlink. It's growing fast!

Many sources on the web seem to quote the Union of Concerned Scientists and here is their database: https://www.ucsusa.org/resources/satellite-database

It's currently at 2219 starlinks and 5465 total, but Starlink has launched more since then.

Re: SpaceX, T-Mobile to connect satellites to cellphones in remote areas

#478

Post by LoveMortuus »

comboy wrote: post #354
arbuge wrote: post #55

More detail here: https://www.cnbc.com/2022/08/25/spacex-and-t-mobile-team-up-... "T-Mobile users will be able to use messaging, MMS and certain messaging apps, from remote points across the lower 48 states, Alaska, Puerto Rico and Hawaii and even some remote points in the water. Eventually, the service will work with voice, Sievert said. T-Mobile plans to include the service in its most popular mobile plans but did…

> to transmit directly to a cell or mobile phone. If it could talk directly with mobile phones it's a game changer. But I don't understand how it could be physically possible without phased array and satellite tracking for a phone to transmit anything back to satellite. If achieved, even a few bytes per minute would already be big.

You could also just have the recipient in the first part of the message block so that the devices that aren't the recipient either just ignore the message or can't decode it.

My biggest question is how do you send a signal to a satellite with your mobile phone. And they're even saying without additional hardware which makes it even more difficult.

Or are they just hoping that there would be no obstructions from your device and the satellite, no roof and a good sunny weather?

Although my knowledge is lacking, my understanding is that 2G has good range at the expense of low data rate. But I have a feeling that many modern phones no longer support 2G, since (at least here in Slovenia, Europe) many providers have over the years lowered or totally removed the number of 2G towers.

Re: SpaceX, T-Mobile to connect satellites to cellphones in remote areas

#479

Post by jillesvangurp »

fragmede wrote: post #99
anonymousiam wrote: post #5

I watched the announcement. Knowing Musk, I'll believe it when I see it, but it sounds promising. Apparently the G2 Starlink satellites will be equipped with large antennas to support cellular users on the existing spectrum. Video was live-streamed, and still available here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qzli-Ww26Qs

Self-driving cars have proven harder than expected, but given the rest of Musk's tale, I wouldn't bet against him. SpaceX is already launching satellites, and Starlink is already providing service. T-mobile owns the frequencies for it, it's "just" a matter of building the satellites and putting them into space. If the claim were more outlandish, it would be harder to buy, but the technology is eminently doable.

Self driving cars are indeed still not there. But the right question to ask about those is who has the highest chance of getting those working first? There are a few companies working on this problem. Tesla is by far the biggest of those companies and they are throwing some serious money at the problem. It's not a safe bet to make but the odds are still pretty decent that they might get there before anyone else does. Their strategy for this seems pretty sound. But obviously it's taking longer than they hoped. A much less safe bet to make would be betting it will never happen.

As for SpaceX, their reputation for getting things done is rock solid right now. If they manage to get starship going, that will be a major leap in launching capabilities. But even just getting the star link network operational, or delivering people to the space station have been enormous accomplishments already.

The only thing that's remarkable about this announcement is how unremarkable it is relative to Elon Musk's other accomplishments. It's a radio on a satellite that connects to a phone. Doesn't sound like rocket science. I'm sure the antennas etc. are amazing but that is essentially commodity technology that he's simply launching to orbit. Doing that cheap enough that stuff like this makes sense to even consider doing is the true accomplishment.

Re: SpaceX, T-Mobile to connect satellites to cellphones in remote areas

#480

Post by DoesntMatter22 »

itsoktocry wrote: post #387
DoesntMatter22 wrote: post #171

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Self driving is one of the hardest, if not the hardest software problems ever to be solved. I think people underestimate just how challenging the problem is. Must says a lot of stupid stuff but in reality he has delivered on the vast majority of it, though as he says it's not always in the time frame he expects.

> I think people underestimate just how challenging the problem is Is this the shifting of the narrative? "People" aren't underestimating the problem. It's widely known to be an extremely difficult problem. Musk said he'd have it done by now, and actually sold the technology. People have been skeptical of it for the better part of a decade.

People underestimate it all the time, just because you don't doesn't mean other don't. If you read any forum they talk about how it should have been solved by now.
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