Azamara Internet (Wi-Fi) with Starlink - How well does it work?

[lisiamc]

2 minutes ago, Riocca said:

Could it be the networking within the ships themselves that holds the key to this particular problem? Just seems strange that the original 3 ships bought from RC have a problem whilst the newest ship which had the whole network replaced in dry dock last year doesn’t.

Possibly Onwards network was installed with a specification that supports the speeds possible with Starlink. If this theory is correct then it’s probable the networks of the other 3 ships will be upgraded next dry dock 

This is what I think, too.

[Grandma Cruising]

3 hours ago, Riocca said:

Could it be the networking within the ships themselves that holds the key to this particular problem? Just seems strange that the original 3 ships bought from RC have a problem whilst the newest ship which had the whole network replaced in dry dock last year doesn’t.

Possibly Onwards network was installed with a specification that supports the speeds possible with Starlink. If this theory is correct then it’s probable the networks of the other 3 ships will be upgraded next dry dock 

Absolutely no problem on Pursuit on the transatlantic in March.

[ECCruise]

Quest this morning. Virtually unusable. No service big chunk of yesterday. 

 

[Grandma Cruising]

3 hours ago, ECCruise said:

Quest this morning. Virtually unusable. No service big chunk of yesterday. 

 

Where is the ship? The issue may be lack of starlink coverage.

[uktog]

If you are near Chinese waters you never used to get service on the old system 

[oddjob16]

3 hours ago, ECCruise said:

Quest this morning. Virtually unusable. No service big chunk of yesterday. 

 

I might be wrong,- please correct me,- but I think Quest has not installed Starlink yet.

Edited April 26, 2023 by oddjob16

[excitedofharpenden]

1 hour ago, oddjob16 said:

I might be wrong,- please correct me,- but I think Quest has not installed Starlink yet.

Odd, pretty sure it's now on Quest.  Added recently. Like in the past couple of months. 

 

Phil 

[oddjob16]

32 minutes ago, excitedofharpenden said:

Odd, pretty sure it's now on Quest.  Added recently. Like in the past couple of months. 

 

Phil 

Phil, that is probably right. My experience on our TA from Rio to Lisbon on the Pursuit was that coverage became more intermittent mid-cruise. This is probably because when you are in the middle of the ocean you don't have the land based augmentation to support you. All in all we had great coverage and strong signals, but then it would be completely gone for 30 minutes. No big deal.😁

[ECCruise]

3 hours ago, oddjob16 said:

I might be wrong,- please correct me,- but I think Quest has not installed Starlink 

Quest definitely has Starlink and streaming was good 4 days ago. 

Pretty variable but when it is good it blows the old system out of the water. 

Edited April 26, 2023 by ECCruise

[ECCruise]

3 hours ago, Grandma Cruising said:

Where is the ship? The issue may be lack of starlink coverage.

Between Taiwan and Hong Kong in heavily trafficked sea lanes. 

But not that far from China coast which could be a factor. 

[uktog]

20 minutes ago, ECCruise said:

 

But not that far from China coast which could be a factor. 

I think that is your answer!

[Baynanno1]

14 hours ago, oddjob16 said:

I might be wrong,- please correct me,- but I think Quest has not installed Starlink yet.

Technicians came on board towards the end of the Sydney to Perth cruise in February to install Starlink during the Perth to Hong Kong cruise.

[Mercruiser]

Starlink recently launched another 56 satellites 2 days ago. These new satellites are still clustered in the "string of pearls" formation, as shown in the screen capture. I counted 7 of these strings, as I spun the virtual globe on my computer. Apparently, these strings are quite visible in the night sky, if the string goes overhead of your location.

 

Live Starlink Satellite Map

 

[Host Jazzbeau]

1 hour ago, Mercruiser said:

Starlink recently launched another 56 satellites 2 days ago. These new satellites are still clustered in the "string of pearls" formation, as shown in the screen capture. I counted 7 of these strings, as I spun the virtual globe on my computer. Apparently, these strings are quite visible in the night sky, if the string goes overhead of your location.

 

Live Starlink Satellite Map

You obviously know a lot more about the Starlink network than I do – will these new satellites help plug a gap in the existing coverage that affects cruise itineraries?  Or is this just another step in the eventual goal of universal Starlink coverage?

 

[PS – just sent you an email about Svalbard.  Didn't want to take this thread Off Topic by replying on that topic here.]

[Mercruiser]

12 hours ago, Host Jazzbeau said:

You obviously know a lot more about the Starlink network than I do – will these new satellites help plug a gap in the existing coverage that affects cruise itineraries?  Or is this just another step in the eventual goal of universal Starlink coverage?

 

[PS – just sent you an email about Svalbard.  Didn't want to take this thread Off Topic by replying on that topic here.]

In general, Starlink is launching a new group of 50-ish satellites every week or two, for a year-to-date total of 14 launches and 671 satellites. This is an impressive launch rate. The total number of operational satellites is 3988.

Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Starlink_and_Starshield_launches#Starlink_Launches

 

To discuss the effect of new satellites on cruise itineraries, I'll divide this into three topics.

 

1) The disparity between Onward (very good 95+ Mbps) and the other Azamara ships (much lower Mbps) will not be solved by more satellites. This is most likely a problem with the networking configuration on ship. The solution will only be found by putting some skilled IT professionals on board to do a root-cause analysis. All Azamara ships should be capable of 95+ Mbps with the existing satellite deployment.

 

2) The mid-ocean coverage will be improved with new satellites. All of the lunches since June 2021 have been the v1.5 satellites which include "Lasers for inter-satellite communication". These lasers are needed for mid-ocean communication far from a ground station. The v1.0 satellites do not have lasers.

 

3) Polar latitudes (> 60 degrees north or south in this discussion) are only improved by satellites placed in polar orbits. Polar orbits are the ones with an Orbital Inclination of 97.6 degrees. There are currently 230 satellites in polar orbits out of a total of 3988 operational satellites. The most recent polar launch (last month) was No. 80 (see chart below) with 46 satellites. 

Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Starlink_and_Starshield_launches#Starlink_Launches

 

 

These 230 polar satellites are not enough to provide consistent coverage. This can be visualized on https://satellitemap.space/#

by looking at Fairbanks, AK. There are many times when there are no satellites in range of Fairbanks. Field reports on Youtube by Alaska residents indicate that the service is fast when it works, but will drop out completely for many minutes until another satellite is in range.

 

I don't think polar coverage will ever be as good as the lower latitudes, simply due to the fact that there are relatively few paying customers in polar regions. This will limit the number of polar launches.

 

 

Edited May 6, 2023 by Mercruiser

[federalexpress]

45 minutes ago, Mercruiser said:

In general, Starlink is launching a new group of 50-ish satellites every week or two, for a year-to-date total of 14 launches and 671 satellites. This is an impressive launch rate. The total number of operational satellites is 3988.

Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Starlink_and_Starshield_launches#Starlink_Launches

 

To discuss the effect of new satellites on cruise itineraries, I'll divide this into three topics.

 

1) The disparity between Onward (very good 95+ Mbps) and the other Azamara ships (much lower Mbps) will not be solved by more satellites. This is most likely a problem with the networking configuration on ship. The solution will only be found by putting some skilled IT professionals on board to do a root-cause analysis. All Azamara ships should be capable of 95+ Mbps with the existing satellite deployment.

 

2) The mid-ocean coverage will be improved with new satellites. All of the lunches since June 2021 have been the v1.5 satellites which include "Lasers for inter-satellite communication". These lasers are needed for mid-ocean communication far from a ground station. The v1.0 satellites do not have lasers.

 

3) Polar latitudes (> 60 degrees north or south in this discussion) are only improved by satellites placed in polar orbits. Polar orbits are the ones with an Orbital Inclination of 97.6 degrees. There are currently 230 satellites in polar orbits out of a total of 3988 operational satellites. The most recent polar launch (last month) was No. 80 (see chart below) with 46 satellites. 

Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Starlink_and_Starshield_launches#Starlink_Launches

 

 

These 230 polar satellites are not enough to provide consistent coverage. This can be visualized on https://satellitemap.space/#

by looking at Fairbanks, AK. There are many times when there are no satellites in range of Fairbanks. Field reports on Youtube by Alaska residents indicate that the service is fast when it works, but will drop out completely for many minutes until another satellite is in range.

 

I don't think polar coverage will ever be as good as the lower latitudes, simply due to the fact that there are relatively few paying customers in polar regions. This will limit the number of polar launches.

 

 

 

My experience on Pursuit earlier this year supports that. We cruised to the Falklands and Chilean Fjords. Sometimes speed was astonishing, up to 90MB, other times nothing.

[Mercruiser]

4 minutes ago, federalexpress said:

 

My experience on Pursuit earlier this year supports that. We cruised to the Falklands and Chilean Fjords. Sometimes speed was astonishing, up to 90MB, other times nothing.

I'm very glad to hear that Pursuit is in the 90+ club, along with Onward. Some of the earlier Pursuit reports in this thread were much slower. Perhaps Azamara is making progress on correcting the slow speed problems.

 

I'm booked on the Chilian Fjords cruise next year on Quest. I hope they have Starlink up to speed by then.

[Grandma Cruising]

1 hour ago, federalexpress said:

 

My experience on Pursuit earlier this year supports that. We cruised to the Falklands and Chilean Fjords. Sometimes speed was astonishing, up to 90MB, other times nothing.

We had very good speeds on Pursuit across the Atlantic

[Mercruiser]

Here are the newly launched polar orbit satellites in their "string-of-pearls" configuration, over Antarctica and northern Russia. Right now, they are at a low altitude of 380 km. Over the next while, they will propel themselves up to an altitude of 590 km and spread out evenly to form a spread-out string of satellites that completely circles the earth. Once these are in their final position, Starlink's polar reliability will improve 

 

 

 

Edited May 6, 2023 by Mercruiser

[johnnyswitzerland]

Amazing info.  Thank you so much, @Mercruiser.

[ECCruise]

Continues to be spotty on Quest. Highest speeds in 3 weeks +/- 1.5 mps. Lowest,  not including outages,  less than .25 mps, like this very minute. 

 

[Mercruiser]

I'm participating in a similar thread on Princess. It appears that Princess has their network configured to limit the download bandwidth for any one user to about 2 - 4 Mbps. The Princess passengers generally view this as a significant improvement over the previous system.

 

In contrast, Azamara appears to be providing a much greater 90+ Mbps, when conditions allow. Of course, I have to acknowlege that Azamara is only providing 90+ Mbps on some of the ships. Others, like Quest are much slower.

 

 

[outtoseacruise]

19 minutes ago, Mercruiser said:

I'm participating in a similar thread on Princess. It appears that Princess has their network configured to limit the download bandwidth for any one user to about 2 - 4 Mbps. The Princess passengers generally view this as a significant improvement over the previous system.

 

In contrast, Azamara appears to be providing a much greater 90+ Mbps, when conditions allow. Of course, I have to acknowlege that Azamara is only providing 90+ Mbps on some of the ships. Others, like Quest are much slower.

 

 

It's the same way on Royal, some ships get incredible speed and others are not much better than before.

Most people will think the throttled speed is an improvement. Those of us that need it to be able to work while onboard know better. Both Princess and Royal like to brag saying they have the fastest internet at sea when it really is throttled. In June I will be on MSC and Royal in the Western & Eastern Mediterranean and will see how it compares to Enchanted Princess in July. 

[Wander58]

We are currently on the Pursuit and the internet has been excellent.

[needingwifi]

Any update on the wifi on the Journey? Wondering if they have fixed the starlink issues by now...