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SpaceX Plans To Send the First of Its 4,425 Super-Fast Internet Satellites Into Space in 2019 (cnbc.com)

Posted by msmash on from the going-forward dept.

Elon Musk's SpaceX has laid out a plan to create a network of internet-providing satellites around Earth. The company hopes to start launching satellites into space in 2019, and will continue to send them in phases until 2024, when the network is expected to reach capacity. From a report:On Wednesday, Patricia Cooper, SpaceX's vice president of satellite government affairs, said later this year, the company will start testing the satellites themselves, launch one prototype before the end of the year and another during the "early months" of 2018. Following that, SpaceX will begin its satellite launch campaign in 2019. "The remaining satellites in the constellation will be launched in phases through 2024," Cooper said before the Senate's Committee on Commerce, Science and Technology. [...] SpaceX argues that the U.S. lags behind other developed nations in broadband speed and price competitiveness, while many rural areas are not serviced by traditional internet providers. The company's satellites will provide a "mesh network" in space that will be able to deliver high broadband speeds without the need for cables.

6 of 160 comments (clear)

  1. Re:That's a lot of satellites by EndlessNameless · · Score: 3

    Not really. I don't think 25-50 ms is that bad, and I've played online with far worse.

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  2. Re:That's a lot of satellites by EndlessNameless · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Apparently, they are going to use phased arrays to track the satellites, so jitter should only be a real concern once every half-hour or so when it switches satellites.

    I wouldn't call it a simple problem, but each piece of the puzzle is relatively well-understood now.

    Getting a fleet of satellites into orbit will be expensive, but being a launch company takes some of the sting out of that.

    Still, with a fleet of 4K satellites and 5- to 7-year lifespans, they will need to replace hundreds of satellites annually. They need some serious economies of scale for this to work.

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  3. Great, ruin all my astrophotos by jfdavis668 · · Score: 3, Informative

    I get enough astrophotoes of space junk now, I don't need 4,425 more objects to avoid taking pictures of.

  4. Re:That's a lot of satellites by EndlessNameless · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Satellites in geostationary orbit are about 500-600 ms, with most of that time being due to the bounce out to orbit and back.

    Since these satellites are 1/30 of the distance (~1200 km vs ~35000 km), the ping time should drop significantly.

    Light traveling in a vacuum (or through the atmosphere) is noticeably faster than light in a fiber optic cable. And sat-to-sat links are straight lines, whereas fiber gets laid wherever there are rights of ways---so the satellite mesh may offer superior latency for some routes.

    All things considered, this really sounds doable. Replacing hundreds of satellites every year would have been an inconceivably expensive cost just a few years ago. But with cheaper launches, smaller satellites, and a potential global market... I would say that this approach makes more sense today than geostationary satellites. As long as there is enough demand to keep lifting new hardware.

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  5. Re:That's a lot of satellites by jon3k · · Score: 3, Informative
    The quoted figure is actually 25-35 ms:

    SpaceX expects its own latencies to be between 25 and 35ms, similar to the latencies measured for wired Internet services. Current satellite ISPs have latencies of 600ms or more, according to FCC measurements.

  6. This is not a new Iridium by joh · · Score: 4, Informative

    Iridium was/is about satellite phones. This isn't. You will need a rather big phased array antenna and this is not a mobile setup.

    It's about replacing the last mile (or the last 10/100/1000 miles) with satellite links. It's about getting WiFi/LTE backhaul everywhere with just a small device to buy and set up instead of digging in cables or whatever.

    It's like the airplane eating railways and the airplane ate railways. Cables and everything you have set up on the ground is expensive because it's different everywhere and you have to buy real estate and do research and actually get your hands dirty. Setting up a satellite terminal is convenient and easy and it's just the same everywhere.

    I mean, this does not mean that it will work out as a business, but the logic behind it is quite convincing.