Internet question

[Mercruiser]

I am on Onward right now. I agree that this new Starlink Maritime system is very fast. I will be interested to hear from Scots Caz, and others how it does on a Trans Atlantic. 

 

When near land, Starlink satellites talk to the nearest ground-based uplink station. This has been the way Starlink has worked since launch for the home, business, and RV programs. The new feature of Starlink Maritime is new satellites that can talk to each other, until they reach a satellite in range of a ground station.This is important for remote Internet far away from land, like a TA journey. (Sorry to nerd-out here. It's an occupational hazard for electrical engineers.)

[Host Jazzbeau]

31 minutes ago, Mercruiser said:

I am on Onward right now. I agree that this new Starlink Maritime system is very fast. I will be interested to hear from Scots Caz, and others how it does on a Trans Atlantic. 

 

When near land, Starlink satellites talk to the nearest ground-based uplink station. This has been the way Starlink has worked since launch for the home, business, and RV programs. The new feature of Starlink Maritime is new satellites that can talk to each other, until they reach a satellite in range of a ground station.This is important for remote Internet far away from land, like a TA journey. (Sorry to nerd-out here. It's an occupational hazard for electrical engineers.)

In layman's terms, all the reports I have read from ships that have Starlink is that the service is terrific – until you hit a dead spot in the satellite coverage, and then it is ... dead.  But overall it's oceans better than the prior slow link.

[Mackdogmolly]

I’m wondering how this will work with the onboard computers in the “In Touch” room. 

[lisiamc]

7 minutes ago, Mackdogmolly said:

I’m wondering how this will work with the onboard computers in the “In Touch” room. 

Very well, apparently. Wè were chatting to a fellow passenger who was doing some work from the In Touch computers because the screens were larger than his tablet. He was really happy 

with the speed he was getting.
 

I think I’ve read that they’re still running an antique version of Windows, though. Starlink won’t help with that, sadly, if that’s the case. 

[Mackdogmolly]

46 minutes ago, lisiamc said:

Very well, apparently. Wè were chatting to a fellow passenger who was doing some work from the In Touch computers because the screens were larger than his tablet. He was really happy 

with the speed he was getting.
 

I think I’ve read that they’re still running an antique version of Windows, though. Starlink won’t help with that, sadly, if that’s the case. 

It must be helping or else they have upgraded their version of Windows. The last time I used the computers in In Touch (Quest June 22), it was abysmal.

[urlaub]

How much does it cost? We will be onboard Quest in May for the Spice Route.

Many seadays

Edited February 27, 2023 by urlaub

[Grandma Cruising]

3 hours ago, urlaub said:

How much does it cost? We will be onboard Quest in May for the Spice Route.

Many seadays

$19.95 a day for the full package, $29.95 for a 1 day pass and $19.95 for 60 minutes. There are discounts depending on your loyalty level and depending on your type of cabin.

[gowilk]

on journey they say that starlink is being pulled from onward as the starlink people were unaware of the sale from rccl.  azamara hq is telling them that they are trying to negotiate a rate with starlink so stay tuned but believe it when you see it until further notice. certainly journey has NOT been updated.

[fruitmachine]

On 2/18/2023 at 8:48 PM, lisiamc said:

In some places it has been really good, recently! It depends on the ship and the area. 
 

 

Unlike earlier in the year, where I'm convinced Azamara were running the internet like a free bar in a whisky warehouse without realising the cost, Onward is mot showing speeds of between 0.19 and 0.25MB in each direction.  There's free access to Azamara.com, and even that is incredibly slow to load.

 

Although this is not unusably slow for email, messaging and basic (mostly text-based) browsing that's about the limit (pun intended!).

It looks like they are preventing access to speedtest.net, so I tested general usage with and without a VPN.  There was no difference, but I was able to run a speed test and got the attached.

 

For comparison, I'm in the middle of the northern Aegean sea, only just in sight of land, and getting 5G signal on my phone much of the time, so I'm running it as a hotspot.

[markpc17]

That's unfortunate.  We had a fantastic experience with Onward but that was back in April/May.  It will make me rethink my future bookings with them since unfortunately I do have to stay connected and do some work while traveling.  I wish they'd just charge a little extra for those who want to stream and keep it free at slower speeds if you don't.  At the very least rather than only allowing awful speeds.  

[Riocca]

Currently onboard Onward and had a discussion with the IT manager regarding the internet and this is the information I was given. Earlier in the year they were testing the capability of the Starlink system and were pushing it as hard as they could with unrestricted bandwidth hence the high speed we were experiencing.

Now the current policy is that  WiFi will be limited to a maximum of 512Kbps this will be the standard package at I believe $19.95 per day including complimentary WiFi with suites and loyalty benefits. High speed WiFi of up to 4 Mbps is available as an upgrade at an additional $7.95 per day cost, however WiFi within the Experience More packages will be the higher speed WiFi.

A flyer offering this package is available onboard although not mentioning speeds as is a note in the voyage overview. 
Please don’t shoot the messenger, the higher speed which we had last cruise is fine for streaming whilst the lower speed has been ok for internet browsing.

 

[markpc17]

Thanks for the info.  As long as there is a path to better speeds and not completely throttled, and the pricing is reasonable it seems like an o.k. concession.  We shall see.  

[Mercruiser]

Fruitmachine & Riocca, Thanks for the update. This is very useful information.

 

[roger b]

On 10/17/2023 at 5:23 PM, Mercruiser said:

Fruitmachine & Riocca, Thanks for the update. This is very useful information.

 

Can you switch log in's from phone to tablet or my wife's phone if I buy a complete cruise package?

[uktog]

28 minutes ago, roger b said:

Can you switch log in's from phone to tablet or my wife's phone if I buy a complete cruise package?

Indeed you can 

[Mercruiser]

4 hours ago, roger b said:

Can you switch log in's from phone to tablet or my wife's phone if I buy a complete cruise package?

On my last Azamara cruise, I was able to do as you ask. But even better, I was able to use the Hotspot feature on my Android phone to share the Internet access with multiple devices (phones, tablets, laptop). iPhones have a similar feature with a different name.