Posted: 1/1/2025 12:34:53 AM EDT
[Last Edit: nikdfish][Edited]
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After the fourth internet drop out with Brightspeed DSL in the last seven days (& second today), I finally bit the bullet & ordered Starlink. Ordered the standard residential package, wall penetration kit & non-penetrating roof ridge mount. Once it's in & running we will be ditching the landline & 6mb DSL. Monthly cost will be about $30 higher. I will have to line up someone to do the rooftop work, not up to climbing on steep shingles these days. Planning on bringing the line in through a dormer wall (or eave) in the loft area. No other viable choices, we are in a non-covered area for wireless, cable or fiber. DSL was the only option when we moved in. Speed increased over time (started at 3mb) but service got worse. |
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| I am using the ridgeline mount since the others didn't work for me. I was pretty suspicious but it has been 100% solid. I'd probably take it down if we were expecting a hurricane or something, but otherwise I don't give it a thought. |
"And I never did get my lawnmower back!" - Bandit 6
"On the bright side, the money we saved by not going to Mars in the 1970s, we spent on welfare and public schools." - @MorlockP
"On the bright side, the money we saved by not going to Mars in the 1970s, we spent on welfare and public schools." - @MorlockP
| We have had Starlink since the beta release and love it! The only other choice was Wild Blue (trash) or Hughs Net (unlubed sandpaper dildo of hate). |
I now have a ban button. Want to see me use it? Keep it up. - Lancelot
You do not fight out of hate, but rather out of the love and compassion you have for those you are trying to protect.
You do not fight out of hate, but rather out of the love and compassion you have for those you are trying to protect.
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I got in with the free hurricane relief plan for the past 3 months. Since then my cable modem has slowly been restored to it's former (lousy but stable) glory. First month after Hurricane - Zero internet over cable Nothing. Nada. Second month- Cable works but at very slow and unreliable speeds Third month - Cable works better but goes out 4x a day I'm still keeping the Starlink. Throughout all this bullshit it has been mostly stable. Peak hours the speed slows a LOT but it's usable and consistent. I game so consistent is what I need. Works great for War Thunder, Baldur's Gate (with friends), DayZ, and many other games. Using a dual-wan router that falls back on Starlink for an hour if my cable modem even thinks about taking a crap. You can't trust these terrestrials. |
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I have one of the old beta Starlink dishes, and I love it. Previously I had DSL, then a long string of miserable cellular hot spots. Starlink has been stable and fast. Last summer fiber was installed in my area. The service company has such a lousy reputation that I have zero intention of switching, and there is a fiber connection at my driveway. I hae found it impossible for a backhoe to disrupt a satellite connection but it sure will find a fiber line. |
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Another user and fan of Star Link here. With our old wisp service we could stream one TV show and mild surfing the internet. That was it. We replaced it with Star Link and now can stream as many TVs as we want and with grandkids over, there can be 7-8 connected devices (tablets and cell phones) with no issues. Our shitty internet service was $80 per month. Star Link is $120 but we dropped satellite TV at $160 per month and added a couple more apps. Overall, we are saving around $60 per month and have unlimited stuff to watch. Took a little while to adapt to apps vs satellite but it's working great. We don't have access to fiber but with as good as Star Link works, I'm not sure I'd switch if fiber came here. |
"It behooves every man to remember that the work of the critic is of altogether secondary importance, and that, in the end, progress is accomplished by the man who does things."
Theodore Roosevelt
Theodore Roosevelt
"SIG 226 - the choice of Seal Team 6
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I put mine up on a flag pole.Attached File |
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slippery as an eel and tighter than a mouses asshole.......... Jane
Proud Member Team Ranstad .... The Fantastic Bastards
slippery as an eel and tighter than a mouses asshole.......... Jane
Proud Member Team Ranstad .... The Fantastic Bastards
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| Get a spare cord, mine is messed up per SL. They are sending a replacement but it’ll be over a week without service until I get it. I’ve had it for 2.5yrs and this is my only issue, while the wait sucks, using cellular now, I’m a happy SL customer, beats the hell outta my old DSL. |
The strongest reason for the people to retain the right to keep and bear arms is, as a last resort, to protect themselves against tyranny in government. - Thomas Jefferson
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Originally Posted By Johnny_Utah_88: I put mine up on a flag pole.https://www.ar15.com/media/mediaFiles/200198/PXL_20241009_224104197_MP_Original_jpeg-3422465.JPG |
USN Retired: APR 1988 - MAY 2008
"My center is giving way, my right is falling back, situation excellent, I attack." —Ferdinand Foch
"My center is giving way, my right is falling back, situation excellent, I attack." —Ferdinand Foch
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I had similar problem with our DSL. Drops increased because the line was obviously going out, but the ISP (Ziply Fiber) just kept sending techs to mess with the router & rotate ports because they didn't want to dig. I would've had respect if they just admitted it wasn't cost effective, but the last drop, they said they'd do a physical line test, & yet the tech just showed up at the house again to do the usual. Just couldn't admit the truth. Neighbors have gen1 SL & sang its raises, so the decision wasn't difficult. Installation wasn't tough, ran the cable through the floor into the crawlspace, then up to the attic in the garage & out the side & up to the roof. I sprung for the weighted roof peak mount, so dish+router+mount package was $600, monthly service is $120/month, $75 less than the old DSL, so the difference will cover the hardware costs in a year, with comparitive savings thereafter. Speed is great, been gaming & streaming without issues. I do recommend. |
| Starlink replaced our slow and unreliable DSL service. Signed up as soon as it was offered in Alaska and was one of the first to get it up in our area of the interior. Service was bad for the first 6 months, so bad they credited us for 6 months service. After that it has gotten much better, if not great. I upgraded to the latest dish/router and gave a co-worker our old system that he has up and running, he is very happy with it. Bought a mini for the RV and it works great. I like that we can turn it on when we need it without any service fees. |
| I tested my Starlink mini on the roof of my 4Runner today and doing 80mph down the freeway in a rainstorm I was consistently pulling down 150+mbps and it didn’t skip a beat. Shit, it was still getting 20mbps underneath the steel canopy of the Costco gas island. Unbelievably impressive! |
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I would love a mini system for emergency use. Helene made me very aware of the need. I have DSL now. All phone service in the county is buried. Phone Co-Op being slow to roll out buried fiber. Electric company is rolling out fiber to using their existing poles. I figure fiber on pole will go down with power lines. Road washes out would take phone and DSL. |
Tennessee Squire
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Originally Posted By GraboidHunter: My Starlink dish was working fine with 2 inches of snow and ice on it but I went ahead and activated the heating feature. Melted it all off in about 5 minutes. Pretty impressive. I keep mine on automatic and never have any buildup at all. Pulls about 45 watts unless the heating mode is running. |
"It behooves every man to remember that the work of the critic is of altogether secondary importance, and that, in the end, progress is accomplished by the man who does things."
Theodore Roosevelt
Theodore Roosevelt
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we had it at our homestead in Wisconsin and took it with us on our move to the Arkansas ozarks. Works great as phone line DSL and cell hot spots are the only thing out here. We even have trees but I did not have to mount that high to get a clear view. My wife works remote and I'm a YouTuber so we put a demand on it. Teams meetings and uploading large video files. The upload is where I notice the biggest improvement. We set up two more routers for a mesh wifi on the property. So the outbuildings and security cameras all work with wifi (have hard wired cameras too) I was surprised how far the wifi is spread out on the property and it's pretty easy to setup a mesh system. What router do you have? the older ones are really cheap now.  Rural internet: Is STARLINK Mesh Wifi the best to Extend range on your homestead? |
have gun will travel
Well you seen much combat? ......... I've seen a little on TV.
We are jolly green giants, walking the Earth with guns.
Lifetime NRA member SADLY
now GOA and ASA member!!!!!
Well you seen much combat? ......... I've seen a little on TV.
We are jolly green giants, walking the Earth with guns.
Lifetime NRA member SADLY
now GOA and ASA member!!!!!
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Attached File |
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They who can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety, deserve neither liberty nor safety. - Benjamin Franklin, 1775
They who can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety, deserve neither liberty nor safety. - Benjamin Franklin, 1775
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Originally Posted By dayphotog: We set up two more routers for a mesh wifi on the property. So the outbuildings and security cameras all work with wifi (have hard wired cameras too) I was surprised how far the wifi is spread out on the property and it's pretty easy to setup a mesh system. What router do you have? the older ones are really cheap now. Starlink works great buy I have a Netgear Orbi mesh network for the rest. It is decent but I am always looking for better. I tried one of the Starlink mesh routers but it never did connect to the main unit. App would just say connecting or configuring and never move on. This was early last year, I suppose I should try it again before selling it off cheap to someone. |
"And I never did get my lawnmower back!" - Bandit 6
"On the bright side, the money we saved by not going to Mars in the 1970s, we spent on welfare and public schools." - @MorlockP
"On the bright side, the money we saved by not going to Mars in the 1970s, we spent on welfare and public schools." - @MorlockP
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Well I finally got around to getting an installer for the roof mount. Ended up calling a local electrical contractor & should have done it earlier. Two guys came out & they had things finished up in about an hour. They mounted the gen3 dish on a gable ridge rather than the main house ridge, which actually makes access easier if needed & reduces wind exposure. The cable comes in via a wall penetration on the gable. I should be getting a UPS in for it today. I go to costco on saturday to get tires mounted & will probably pick up a 3 piece, Wifi7, Deco Mesh system while there. Might as well do a full upgrade on the house wireless. The units have 4 ethernet ports, so I can ditch some extenders / routers that were being used primarily as wireless adapters. One of the higher test results during the first hour of use, lowest have been like 37down 12 up. A lot of variability so far. Attached File |
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Ours is very consistent. We have found occasional drop out in extremely hard rain storms. But regular rain doesn’t cause any issues. Last winter during a snow storm it never dropped at all. Friend of mine knows a guy who does installs for Dish or Direct Tv and he said he’s looking for a new job. He predicts satellite TV will be mostly or totally a thing of the past within 5 years as people go to streaming services. We got rid of Dish and now spend less money and have FAR more watching options. |
"It behooves every man to remember that the work of the critic is of altogether secondary importance, and that, in the end, progress is accomplished by the man who does things."
Theodore Roosevelt
Theodore Roosevelt
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Coverage with the gen3 router in the loft is pretty good so far. Even the WiFi printer (mx922) is getting a good connection. I may hold off on doing the deco mesh for a while to evaluate the need/benefits. All the little connected items, like weather station, thermostat, house NVR, TV, etc. connected OK & working well. |
| We've had Starlink for several years. We are very rural, mountains of VT and its socked in low clouds and raining atm. Zero complaints, It's been incredibly reliable. I'm watching a podcast on youtube and surfing Arfcom on one monitor, gaming online on the other and the boss is streaming TV in the bedroom. I put it on a pipe mount on the barn, used the extended wire through the rafters to the Starlink modem and shut off the router portion on it then ran 150' of cat 6 in an extra conduit to the house with a router in the basement then an off shoot to the shop from there as well as wifi and wire in the house (because that's as far as the cat 6 made it). I'd say I've completely stretched the limits and have had zero issues |
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I appreciate the info. I haven't looked into Starlink much, but I do know that I want it for a future RV. How feasible would it be to take the house unit with us whenever we travel? We have line-of-sight internet now through a local company and it's pretty good. |
"What is socialism? The most difficult and tortuous way to progress from capitalism to capitalism." -Stated at an intel conference, East Berlin, Oct. 1988
"Every election is a sort of advance auction sale of stolen goods." -H.L. Mencken
"Every election is a sort of advance auction sale of stolen goods." -H.L. Mencken
| Installed starlink last year here. DSL only other option and it sucks. Been super happy with speed and connectivity of starlink. They installed fiberoptic this year , then the big ice storm took it all out. I had starlink while running a generator, while most others in town had fiber optic and cable internet down . |
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I just changed my Starlink plan from Residential Unlimited to the backup 50GB/mo plan and I'm already regretting it as my cable modem provider has decide to gift me with 70% packet loss to my favorite game server this weekend. On Starlink I'm at 0% packet loss. They have good connectivity. |
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I neglected to provide pics, so here they are. Install location (circled in green) at the front of the house on a gable ridge. Attached File Closer view. Attached File The cable wraps around under the gable soffet & runs down the siding trim before the wall penetration point. You can make out the grommet sealing the penetration. Attached File |
| None of the starlink mounts were right for where I wanted to install it so I found a 3d printed one on Amazon or eBay that gave me what I wanted and then I built a mount out of black iron pipe. I screwed the mount to a front porch post. |
"It behooves every man to remember that the work of the critic is of altogether secondary importance, and that, in the end, progress is accomplished by the man who does things."
Theodore Roosevelt
Theodore Roosevelt
| We've had Starlink for about 4 years. It completely changed what we were able to do in the household (as far as internet goes). I guess the fact that we don't even consider internet "issues" at home anymore is a testament to it's reliability, latency and bandwidth. We all just do whatever we want to do (stream, download, game) without a second thought. |
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Still using the Starlink WiFi services & have not gone the Deco mesh route at this point. I ordered one of the new "mini" routers from starlink & got the $40 unit in today (included free shipping). It was wirelessly recognized by the main router and added as a mesh node without issue. I cabled it to a 5 port gigabit switch to provide Ethernet to three devices. I had previously used an old dual band router as an access port for them. With it gone, it is a purely starlink system. |
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I got rid of Frontier DLS at the cabin as they sucked but it was only approx $70 month and they allowed you to put the service into vacation mode for a small monthly fee. My two options are fiber for $115 a month plus taxes etc and $75 install, and they allow a vacation mode as well. or Starlink for $120 plus initial equipment cost. I did not see it on their website but Starlink offer a vacation mode or temporary suspension of service for a small monthly fee like many internet providers? |
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Originally Posted By CTM1: I got rid of Frontier DLS at the cabin as they sucked but it was only approx $70 month and they allowed you to put the service into vacation mode for a small monthly fee. My two options are fiber for $115 a month plus taxes etc and $75 install, and they allow a vacation mode as well. or Starlink for $120 plus initial equipment cost. I did not see it on their website but Starlink offer a vacation mode or temporary suspension of service for a small monthly fee like many internet providers? Only the "roaming" subscriptions can be set to a non-active mode (paused). With residential you have to cancel service to stop billing & "reactivate" the subscription to resume service. This is actually pretty painless as long as you are not in an oversubscribed location. I cancelled service for a couple of months while waiting for install. When I reactivated the subscription they charged a prorated amount for the month remainder & charged the full amount at the start of the next billing cycle. The only possible "gotcha" is in areas that are at/over capacity. In that case you would have to go on a waiting list or change to a roaming subscription. You can look at the coverage map to see if you are in or close to an area that is reaching capacity. They consider the initial subscription starting when equipment arrives but only start billing after the initial 30 days passes. Billing will start at that point (prepayment for the coming month) whether or not you have actually connected the equipment. If you have a delay in installing your equipment you have to cancel the subscription to avoid getting billed at your standard rate. I believe there are no prorated refunds for any unused days when you cancel a subscription. |
| For those of us who live rural and don’t have access to fiber, Starlink is a game changer. For those who have easy access to fiber, some people in storm prone areas have found their fiber supplied internet to go down in the aftermath of a storm while StarLink keeps working. Not saying you SHOULD switch from fiber to StarLink but it does have some advantages. |
"It behooves every man to remember that the work of the critic is of altogether secondary importance, and that, in the end, progress is accomplished by the man who does things."
Theodore Roosevelt
Theodore Roosevelt
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Originally Posted By ColtRifle: For those of us who live rural and don’t have access to fiber, Starlink is a game changer. For those who have easy access to fiber, some people in storm prone areas have found their fiber supplied internet to go down in the aftermath of a storm while StarLink keeps working. Not saying you SHOULD switch from fiber to StarLink but it does have some advantages. we lose signal in heavy rain with starlink but not for long (rain of like 2+ inches) |
have gun will travel
Well you seen much combat? ......... I've seen a little on TV.
We are jolly green giants, walking the Earth with guns.
Lifetime NRA member SADLY
now GOA and ASA member!!!!!
Well you seen much combat? ......... I've seen a little on TV.
We are jolly green giants, walking the Earth with guns.
Lifetime NRA member SADLY
now GOA and ASA member!!!!!
|
I had recently noticed some price reductions. The biggie is the non-penetrating roof mount (which is what we used) now $99. It was previously $300, which is what we paid. I thought I saw the Gen3 mesh router for $80, but checked just now & it is the same $120 I had seen earlier. Not sure if I saw $80 or not at this point, but maybe it was a temporary reduction that reverted. The $99 roof ridgeline mount is still showing & a good price for something that makes for a pretty painless roof top mount. Also works on flat roofs. |
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Starlink now supports the ability to add a guest Wifi network with residential accounts. I guess it was in a recent firmware update. You just go into "settings" on the starlink app & click on the "add network" option. There is a slider button to enable the "guest" option then set up a network name & password. Guest network users can access the internet but not the local network or star link functions. |
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The current Starlink home in the loft. Attached File A Terramaster F2-423 NAS & D4-320 expansion box are on the shelf below, along with a UPS & the power bricks. The NAS is cabled to one of the router ethernet ports. |