Starlink satellites are a swarm which operates in a low earth orbit with a period of around 90 minutes, you’re constantly changing satellites much like a cell phone switches towers as you drive.
Instead I'd guess this is a delay during reorientation of the physical antenna or repointing of the phased array.
The phased array can theoretically be repointed in milliseconds, but in a rush to launch I wouldn't be surprised if it doesn't take a few seconds to lock on to the signal, do channel characterization, and adjust data routing stuff to use the new link. During that time, a bunch of packets are lost, and you then have to wait for the TCP timers to expire before retransmission.
End user ends up seeing a 5 second glitch.
I remember reading an analysis here on a previous posting about starlink that under load, it is going to have pretty limited throughput (on top of higher latency). I do not see how that will get solved.
The first sentence of the article makes it clear the 95% figure is in reference to speed.
“Some of the participants in SpaceX’s public Starlink beta are reporting internet speeds higher than 95 percent of U.S. internet users.”
This really needs more precise wording. What percentage of Starlink users (more than 5%?) and what's the speed difference?
Fast forward to everyone having 4g phones, now in practice I see like 1-2% of those speeds typically.
I have no idea the inner workings of starlink's protocol, but these aspects of wireless seem inevitable. once theres more simultaneous connections than in limited beta, each connection gets a smaller time slice or less frequency band, no?
I do not see how its solved either.
Currently I have rural DSL, approximately 3mbps down, 1 mbps up, but cheaper and reliable. The one person who has starlink beta is posting 200+ mbps screenshots but if everyone here connects I'm skeptical the result isn't slower, less reliable, more expensive than what's already here.