Re:Starlink dishes go into “thermal shutdown” once they hit ...
by shaklee3 on Saturday June 19, 2021 @12:47AM
(#27557837)
No. I said this earlier, but they won a rural auction from the FCC where they were given 900 million dollars for Starlink, which includes providing coverage in areas well above 100 degrees f on a regular basis. They are required to provide this. If they hadn't won the auction, they can do whatever they want. The auction had service level agreements that could not be met with this limitation. It's a fundamental flaw that has to be fixed.
Re:Starlink dishes go into “thermal shutdown” once they hit ...
by _Microft on Saturday June 19, 2021 @03:25AM
(#27558533)
Do you know when they need to have started providing service there at the latest?
They began providing service at higher latitude earlier because that is where the satellites "lump" due to their inclination, so that they needed fewer satellites in total.
They are also required to cover Alaska and have now started launching Starlink satellites into (near-)polar orbits. If these are test sats or actually operational I do not know but they seem to be working on these issues.
All in all they seem to be following a launch-early strategy.
The rural communities most likely to use Starlink are also those most likely to be relying on satellite dishes right now, which seem to frequently suffer from similar problems.
My parents pay for internet from both HughesNet and AT&T because the former stops working whenever it snows more than an inch or two (even after clearing the dish manually) and the latter constantly drops any time there's thick rain, heavy winds, etc. There's dozens of days throughout each year where neither work and they're just SOL in terms of TV or internet.