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Comment by zachmu | Hacker News Reader

Why are we pretending starlink doesn't exist?

I don't think we are. Starlink is better than pretty much all of the alternatives if you can't get good wired broadband. (And can be a real game-changer in rural areas.) But it's mostly worse than good wired alternatives.

It doesn't really change the point of the article.

There are ways to make fibre broadband available, even in rural communities.

Fibre is always going to beat Starlink.

The ways to make it available involve stringing hundreds of miles of line. Of course it's possible, it's just prohibitively expensive because of the extremely low density.

Starlink costs $15k over 10 years and at the end of that you have nothing to show for the outlay.

Fiber costs far less than $15k on average and it is as good as new after 10 years.

But most rural consumers aren't ready/able to pay the outlay needed for the build. Normal suburban/urban residential broadband costs >$1000 per household to build, but rural broadband where you need many poles or lots of trenching is many times more expensive.

In some places the cost could easily be over $15k per home passed.

It’s not the cost per passing that matters, it’s the average cost per passing that matters.

Most consumers can’t or won’t pay the outlay up front, but that’s why you use financing.

Why are we pretending that rural residents are not deserving of something better than Starlink?

It is better than DSL, but it sure as hell isn’t better than fiber — by a long shot.

It doesn't have to be better than fiber. 100 megabits is more than enough bandwidth for almost anyone, especially people accustomed to having no bandwidth.

Talking about what people deserve is a fun way to avoid the actual question of who will pay for it. You can buy a starlink satellite for $600 today, then get broadband service for $120 per month.

People here are obsessed with fiber but I don't think the bandwidth I get from Comcast in an exurban Boston community is a lot better than Starlink.

Bandwidth needs could certainly increase in some manner in the future that makes a gigabit connection to every home in the US that gets electricity a practical necessity. But, for now, Starlink or the equivalent is a perfectly reasonable alternative at a cost that is on par with various other utilities.

It's not even better than cable. There was someone on HN maybe 2 months ago who shared their speed tests and every evening it dropped to 6mbps.

Neighborhood congestion is the bane of every ISP, and starlink is no exception here. It definitely gets slower during Netflix hours, but it never becomes unusable.

> Neighborhood congestion is the bane of every ISP

Not really, congestion is only an issue for poorly designed or poorly run ISPs.

is it really the same as broadband? with their latency? 5G might be more realistic

Same as fibre? No. Same as broadband generically? Pretty much. I've used it and it pretty much lets most people do what they consider normal internet stuff (including streaming video, video calls, etc.) I'm not a gamer so can't speak to stringent latency demands.

Note that Starlink is LEO satellites so different from geosynchronous satellites in terms of latency.

Latency is surprisingly good, usually under 20 milliseconds. Not the same as a wired connection obviously, but plenty good enough for almost every application.

Are you pretending that Starlinks upfront cost of $599 and $120/mo is affordable for the community that this article is about?

$120 per month is well within the range of most monthly internet plans. The article doesn't say how much monthly service for this county-driven initiative will cost. Yes, there's an upfront cost (though cable providers typically have a hookup too) but it's not huge in comparison to monthly fees.

I'd consider paying that much for 10gpbs, but nothing less.

That's nice for you.

We got starlink for our rural property. We were previously paying over $200 a month for vastly inferior service (long range Wi-Fi), much slower and dropped out all the time.

If you can get a wired connection, get it. Starlink is for people who can't, and it's far and away the best option for those people.

If you have better/cheaper options, by all means take them. Many people do not so it's pay that or do without.

Some people, but I very much doubt most.

I wrote "many." And, yes, many people do not have good wired Internet access and paying a relatively small premium to get the equivalent of wired broadband access at all is worth it for a great many of those people. No one is asking you to pay if you have better options.

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