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Comment by dawnerd | Hacker News Reader

You can already try it with T-Mobile and it’s pretty limited. Great if you need sms and there’s no other towers around. Still requires line of sight.

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The limitations on the current T-Satellite service have a lot to do with the spectrum being shared with terrestrial towers and the low number of satellites.

The new constellation will be physically closer, with much larger antennas and a much larger number of satellites with a much higher capacity per satellite. It will also use dedicated spectrum with no terrestrial interference. Coverage and speed will be improved tremendously.

You’re still limited to the transmission and receive capabilities of mobile devices which already struggle with current cell networks. I’m Not arguing it won’t be nice for people truly remote, but people keep acting like this will replace cell towers, which it won’t.

The limitations of mobile devices are mostly due to regulation (power limits and spectrum allocation and other requirements) and not inherent to the technology of handheld devices. And despite this, you can increase performance almost arbitrarily if you are able to increase the size and power and number of the antennas on the other side.

Yes, the Gen3 Starlink Direct-to-Cell constellation won't replace cell towers in urban or suburban areas. But I believe it could replace them in rural areas.

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