Re:SpaceX Starlink has some hiccups as expected, but users a...
by walrus01 on Monday November 16, 2020 @12:48AM
(#25108508)
The military uses a hell of a lot of iridium, but from context it really sounds to me like he's describing the low end of the COTS C/ku band ISP market.
Until very recently you have not been able to move more than 2400 bps through an individual iridium link, limiting it to very low data rate IP networking and single user at a time per device.
The military itself uses a lot more geostationary than you might think at first glance. They don't have their own iridium sized low earth orbit narrow band networks. There's many series of DoD satellites in geostationary, and they also lease a lot of commercial transponder capacity.
Until very recently you have not been able to move more than 2400 bps through an individual iridium link, limiting it to very low data rate IP networking and single user at a time per device.
The military itself uses a lot more geostationary than you might think at first glance. They don't have their own iridium sized low earth orbit narrow band networks. There's many series of DoD satellites in geostationary, and they also lease a lot of commercial transponder capacity.