Starlink Internet Seems Like A Fail To Me. Why Is It So Slow?

[RichYak]

7 minutes ago, prmssk said:

But once that internet reaches the ship from the satellite, it has to pass through cables, routers, and various other IT equipment beyond my basic understanding before it gets to the end user...

...all of which already exists. None of what you describe needs to be replaced to provide speeds to the end user that Starlink can offer--even on older mass market cruise ships. New satellite dishes are mounted on the exterior of the ship, wired to centralized Starlink receivers that would replace the ones that are already in place. Disconnect the cables from the old receivers and connect them to the new receivers and that's it. Of course I'm sure I'm oversimplifying, but not by much.

 

Celebrity made quick work of this, even on its older ships, without replacing any of the cabling and Cisco routers and repeaters that were in use throughout the ship delivering the prior inferior technology.

[Charles4515]

9 minutes ago, RichYak said:

...all of which already exists. None of what you describe needs to be replaced to provide speeds to the end user that Starlink can offer--even on older mass market cruise ships. New satellite dishes are mounted on the exterior of the ship, wired to centralized Starlink receivers that would replace the ones that are already in place. Disconnect the cables from the old receivers and connect them to the new receivers and that's it. Of course I'm sure I'm oversimplifying, but not by much.

 

Celebrity made quick work of this, even on its older ships, without replacing any of the cabling and Cisco routers and repeaters that were in use throughout the ship delivering the prior inferior technology.

The old servers and routers may not be capable of supporting higher speeds. Just connecting is probably not enough. When I upgraded to Gigabit fiber internet here at home I didn’t get much a speed increase until I upgraded my router to a Gigabit router. And the WiFi 6 on the new router made a big difference too.

Edited April 22, 2023 by Charles4515

[Jim_Iain]

8 hours ago, mahdnc said:

 

I found this active thread to be informative. CC members on the different ships so far (Apex, Millennium, and Constellation) are paying their internet speed tests conducted several times a day. You may want to check it out. 

 

 

 

Yup that is the day the flipped it on on Solstice -   I was blown away because they hadn't announced that it was active.   The previous cruise it was only available to Staff to test.   On the second sailing they had throttled it back.

 

I have a separate thread that you can find on the Celebrity Forum and have been posting daily tests for last week and will be posting daily for the TransAtlantic on Apex that has just departed Port Everglades.

 

I invite all regardless of ship to post their results -  The following information will be helpful to all to understand Celebrity /Starlink expectations.

 

Date / Time

Ship

Premium or Basic

Location

 

Many would enjoy someone with basic to post a comparison.   I know you can't post on CC on the Basic Package but if you could take screen shots and post when you have a good connection many will appreciate.

[mnocket]

25 minutes ago, RichYak said:

None of what you describe needs to be replaced to provide speeds to the end user that Starlink can offer-

Please, it's painfully obvious that you are in way over your head when talking about network infrastructure.  

[Jim_Iain]

Enjoying the posts.   OK - I'll admit I'm a techno nerd that lives in the middle of Silicon Valley and have a Gig+ Fiber unlimited data connection.

 

We do cruise a lot and since the resumption of cruising have been on Eclipse, Summit, Solstice and now Apex.  Solstice brought  Starlilnk Live on the December 3, 2022.    I know there are lots of tests done on that Live thread but would almost be impossible to find as it was a lively Live post.

 

I'm sure we all have different technology background and expectations.   I would really enjoy hearing especially from those that are complaining of their experience and expectation.

 

It is important to understand that speed is just one measurement that will impact you experience.   If you click on the detail view of the Speed Test by Ookla which I find the best for speed tests.  

 

One thing to look at is the Packet Loss % -   A couple days ago for a short period we were experiencing as high as 25% packet Loss  -  That will be a major impact

 

Another important number to look at under each speed is Jitter -  the high and low is variation of packet speeds.   This is caused by the number of guests that are all sending and receiving data at the same time.  Basically it's network congestion.  Another example would be if you are on a Zoom Call and you son is playing a high data usage came Zoom starts pixelating .

 

Finally as many have said signal strength to the Router.    In many of the suites you have a router/access point in your room is either on the wall or ceiling.   If you don't have one in your room - open your door and look up and down the hallway and look for the access point on the ceiling or wall.   Like at home the closer you are to the router the higher your speed.  

 

This is what my access point looks like in my room.  
 

 

 

 

Edited April 22, 2023 by Jim_Iain

[mahdnc]

2 hours ago, Jim_Iain said:

 

Yup that is the day the flipped it on on Solstice -   I was blown away because they hadn't announced that it was active.   The previous cruise it was only available to Staff to test.   On the second sailing they had throttled it back.

 

I have a separate thread that you can find on the Celebrity Forum and have been posting daily tests for last week and will be posting daily for the TransAtlantic on Apex that has just departed Port Everglades.

 

I invite all regardless of ship to post their results -  The following information will be helpful to all to understand Celebrity /Starlink expectations.

 

Date / Time

Ship

Premium or Basic

Location

 

Many would enjoy someone with basic to post a comparison.   I know you can't post on CC on the Basic Package but if you could take screen shots and post when you have a good connection many will appreciate.

 

a spreadsheet....

[Honolulu Blue]

4 hours ago, Jim_Iain said:

I know you can't post on CC on the Basic Package but if you could take screen shots and post when you have a good connection many will appreciate.

 

That wasn't true for me on my last Celebrity cruise on the Summit in February and March.  Starlink was onboard then.  I had the basic package and was able to post here all I wanted - even with pretty photos.

 

I did several speed tests, mostly from my interior cabin in steerage class.  I only used the basic test from Speedtest's Web site.  The good news is that the speeds I received were very consistent.  The bad news is they were consistently... not so hot - all readings were between 0.87 mbps and 0.95 mbps.  Pings were all over the place - from under 100 ms to over 700 ms.  Here's a typical screen capture from that cruise:

 

 

4 hours ago, Jim_Iain said:

This is what my access point looks like in my room.  
 

I may or may not have had this in my cabin.  If I did, I would have completely dismissed it, because it looks like a smoke detector.  I'll have to pay better attention on my next Celebrity cruises (I currently have one scheduled for next March).

Edited April 23, 2023 by Honolulu Blue

[Ken the cruiser]

I just did another Ookla internet speed test using my Premium service package while currently on the Eclipse between Australia and New Zealand, and once again we are receiving great service considering we’re out on the high seas in the middle of nowhere. Is technology great!! 😁

 

Some folks on CC have posted these speeds are unacceptable. I guess I’m just one of those that remembers how it was on cruise ships not that long ago, say 5 years, when you had to hunt for the sweet spot on the ship, paid for internet service by the minute, and usually got the best service to download email after 10 pm! And back then we didn’t even think about getting quality service in our cabin. Fast forward to today. All of my speed tests and postings to my my Live From thread have been done on this cruise in our cabin. 😁 But then again, we’re on a cruise and have absolutely no desire to stream anything. 
 

 

Edited April 23, 2023 by Ken the cruiser

[Mark_T]

9 hours ago, Honolulu Blue said:

That wasn't true for me on my last Celebrity cruise on the Summit in February and March.  Starlink was onboard then.  I had the basic package and was able to post here all I wanted - even with pretty photos.

It was however true on Eclipse in January with Starlink.

 

Never once managed to load a page on this site using the 'Surf' package.

[TeeRick]

I find this thread pretty interesting with good information from the CC folks on here.  The OP YouTube guy was just posting a catchy title for click bait purposes.  I did not bite.  And he never returned. 

[d9704011]

1 minute ago, Mark_T said:

It was however true on Eclipse in January with Starlink.

 

Never once managed to load a page on this site using the 'Surf' package.

I was on Eclipse over the Xmas/New Year period and couldn't do much with Cruise Critic; I had no problem with anything else I expected to be able to do with my package.

[NutsAboutGolf]

2 minutes ago, TeeRick said:

I find this thread pretty interesting with good information from the CC folks on here.  The OP YouTube guy was just posting a catchy title for click bait purposes.  I did not bite.  And he never returned. 

 

The OP is a top cruise youtuber with almost a .5M subscribers; he always posts on CC and almost never replies/engages on CC as he wants the conversations to happen in the comment section in his video

 

When he posts a negative video about X, in this case how slow the internet is on the Solstice despite have Starlink, it will be brought to X's attention and X is more likely to make corrections than from a few dozen of us whining here on CC

[Sigyn]

14 hours ago, mnocket said:

Please, it's painfully obvious that you are in way over your head when talking about network infrastructure.  

My mother always said if you can't say something nice, then don't say anything at all. 

[Honolulu Blue]

10 hours ago, Honolulu Blue said:

That wasn't true for me on my last Celebrity cruise on the Summit in February and March.  Starlink was onboard then.  I had the basic package and was able to post here all I wanted - even with pretty photos.

 

15 minutes ago, Mark_T said:

It was however true on Eclipse in January with Starlink.

 

Never once managed to load a page on this site using the 'Surf' package.

 

12 minutes ago, d9704011 said:

I was on Eclipse over the Xmas/New Year period and couldn't do much with Cruise Critic; I had no problem with anything else I expected to be able to do with my package.

Last February on the Summit I had problems posting to CC with Basic Internet (no Starlink at that time), but no problems this time around, other than the problems with posting anywhere with 200+ ms pings and sub-1 mbps speeds.  I won't try to explain what happened to us and it's probably not worth the effort to try.  It's probably just a YMMV sort of thing.

[Charles4515]

9 minutes ago, NutsAboutGolf said:

 

When he posts a negative video about X, in this case how slow the internet is on the Solstice despite have Starlink, it will be brought to X's attention and X is more likely to make corrections than from a few dozen of us whining here on CC

That he posted will get attention. Will X make corrections? Time will tell. X management must be aware of the slow internet they are providing and has not yet done infrastructure improvement onboard. They don’t need a YouTuber to tell them. The YouTuber is just getting clicks for his personal benefit. Not ours. Better satellite coverage was easy, just a bunch of inexpensive antennas that are easy and fast to put up. The onboard improvements if they decide to do them, that is a business decision, new routers and access points can’t be done as fast as putting up those Starlink antennas on the outside of the ship. Some might have to wait for dry docks. That Carnival ship with the blazing speeds…..that shows what is possible with the right infrastructure.

[Charles4515]

22 minutes ago, Honolulu Blue said:

 

 

Last February on the Summit I had problems posting to CC with Basic Internet (no Starlink at that time), but no problems this time around, other than the problems with posting anywhere with 200+ ms pings and sub-1 mbps speeds.  I won't try to explain what happened to us and it's probably not worth the effort to try.  It's probably just a YMMV sort of thing.

It was easy to post and read when Cruise Critic had their mobile app. That was basically downloading and uploading packets. I don’t even bother with the mobile browser or even a browser on a computer. Cruise Critic is too frustrating to bother with using a web browser with the current state of onboard internet. That social network though with its app seems to work good enough……

[NutsAboutGolf]

7 minutes ago, Charles4515 said:

That he posted will get attention. Will X make corrections? Time will tell. X management must be aware of the slow internet they are providing and has not yet done infrastructure improvement onboard. They don’t need a YouTuber to tell them. The YouTuber is just getting clicks for his personal benefit. Not ours. Better satellite coverage was easy, just a bunch of inexpensive antennas that are easy and fast to put up. The onboard improvements if they decide to do them, that is a business decision, new routers and access points can’t be done as fast as putting up those Starlink antennas on the outside of the ship. Some might have to wait for dry docks. That Carnival ship with the blazing speeds…..that shows what is possible with the right infrastructure.

 

By no means am I disputing he posts videos in hopes to gaining views and subscribers, I'm simply pointing out there is value to his videos whether one chooses to watch them or not

[Honolulu Blue]

31 minutes ago, Charles4515 said:

It was easy to post and read when Cruise Critic had their mobile app. That was basically downloading and uploading packets. I don’t even bother with the mobile browser or even a browser on a computer. Cruise Critic is too frustrating to bother with using a web browser with the current state of onboard internet. That social network though with its app seems to work good enough……

I've never used CC's mobile app.  I've always used the default browser on my phone and Silk, the default browser on my tablet, when posting here.  Most of the time it's worked all right for me.

[PTC DAWG]

19 hours ago, Charles4515 said:

Why come here and post that your phone is turned off? It just makes you look silly. 

I like it…

[Charles4515]

1 hour ago, PTC DAWG said:

I like it…

Nothing wrong about having your phone turned off but why post about it on a thread about Starlink? That’s your choice to turn it off. It has nothing to with Starlink. 

[neverlaysup]

On 4/22/2023 at 5:48 AM, Spaniel Lover said:

Two of my recent cruises have used Starlink as the Internet Service Provider, including a recent cruise on Celebrity Solstice.  I had high hopes that Starlink was going to improve the quality of Internet access on cruise ships, but in both cases, the Internet connection was quite slow.

Take a look at this video where I show you the specifics of the Internet speeds I was able to get using Starlink on cruise ships, compared to a much faster connection I had recently on a cruise ship that was not using Starlink.
 

 

Did you have standard WIFI or premium?? I would imaging X is going to throttle the standard WIFI to a speed similar to the old WIFI otherwise nobody would upgrade service.

[VernRDH]

On Summit now, both DH and I having no problems with speeds. Using my tablet and phone interchangeably, have found it to work rather well. At the Solarium currently, but worked well from our interior cabin on deck 9 also.  

Tomorrow will be a test since I am going to attempt to remote into my office with chrome remote desktop. We'll see how that goes. 

[KevinCruises1978]

I’m on the Edge for the TA crossing with the premium internet package and never broke 5Mbps. I live in rural Montana and use starlink at home with down speeds routinely in 200s during one winter storm it dropped to 25. I feel like Celebrity is gaslighting us.