Internet

[RaeGordon]

Is it possible to do zoom meetings from aboard the ship? If not, is anyone aware of any device or service that can be purchased to allow that level of connectivity? We are a few weeks out from sailing and a family member, in grad school, just had a significant wrinkle thrown in their summer plans, and I’m trying to do my due diligence on this.

[AussieBoyTX]

I have done Zoom meetings successfully from the ship, but it's by no means guaranteed. It will depend on a bunch of things, including what part of the world you're in and how many other people are on the ship with you. Audio Zoom has a better probability than Video Zoom.

 

It's possible that Ponant will have Starlink on their ships at some point in the future, but that's not the case today. As an individual, Starlink Maritime has a $2500 equipment cost and a $250 / month service fee. If in a Starlink service area, that provides extremely fast internet: https://www.starlink.com/maritime

 

I am not aware of any other service that would work on a ship.

 

The other thought I had is if the ship has ports of call, perhaps your student could take advantage of time zone difference and schedule the calls while on land. 5G or LTE cell service are both fast enough to stream video on a Zoom conference.

[Jim_Iain]

I'm  mainly a Celebrity Cruiser and was on Celebrity Solstice when they brought Starlink alive in November.   It was incredibly fast hitting up and down at 150+ Meg.    By the next cruise they fine tuned it and implemented speed throttling.    They seem to be set at 5 Download and 3 Upload for the Premium.

 

I had a thread on the Celebrity Thread on Starlink speeds for the TransAtlantic Crossing.   They speeds stayed steady at the throttled 5/3.   No drops for the entire crossing and similar speeds reported on those doing the Sydney to Vancouver voyage.  

 

Definitely good enough for Zoom.   I was able to live stream YouTubeTV the entire cruise with only occasional buffering.  

 

I hope Ponant implements as Starlink seems to be a good solution.

[Host Jazzbeau]

1 hour ago, Jim_Iain said:

I'm  mainly a Celebrity Cruiser and was on Celebrity Solstice when they brought Starlink alive in November.   It was incredibly fast hitting up and down at 150+ Meg.    By the next cruise they fine tuned it and implemented speed throttling.    They seem to be set at 5 Download and 3 Upload for the Premium.

Any idea why they throttled it?  Are they paying by the MB for usage?

[AussieBoyTX]

1 minute ago, Host Jazzbeau said:

Any idea why they throttled it?  Are they paying by the MB for usage?

 

Starlink has a maximum throughput of about 200mbps, so they're probably trying to avoid saturating their bandwidth and don't have an easy way to do that dynamically.

[Host Jazzbeau]

3 minutes ago, AussieBoyTX said:

Starlink has a maximum throughput of about 200mbps, so they're probably trying to avoid saturating their bandwidth and don't have an easy way to do that dynamically.

Funny:  cruise lines have no problem with 'dynamic pricing' but can't handle 'dynamic bandwidth'  😉

[Jim_Iain]

On 5/28/2023 at 6:36 PM, Host Jazzbeau said:

Any idea why they throttled it?  Are they paying by the MB for usage?

Since it is a shared connection it was throttled to provide all users a similar experience.  My understanding is all ships work on rotating basis so no one user is hogging all the bandwidth.

 

There was still plenty of bandwidth with the premium internet for posting to CC, Streaming things like Netflix etc.   I believe ships only pay for the connection and not MB utilization.

[garykool81]

You absolutely will not be able to do Zoom meetings aboard any Ponant ship. Their Internet is among the most outdated in the industry, and the worst I've experienced on any modern ships. As you can see, I've sailed with them multiple times on three of their ships -- two of them among the newest in their fleet. I found the Internet speeds, especially while at sea when demand is higher, to be as slow as 15KB/s -- literally 1990s dial-up speeds. On the best of days, I got to perhaps 100KB/s -- so think very early age DSL circa early 2000s. 

 

I often work while I am on vacation, and the WiFi aboard their ships has been pretty challenging. At times, it was so slow that it would take over a minute to load a text-only email. 

 

Definitely make alternative arrangements for connectivity if you need to have Zoom meetings while onboard! 

[Jim_Iain]

Thanks for the information -   rather disappointing to hear their Internet is so slow.   I'm sure we will survive and making alternative plans.   e.g. take a vacation from my Meeting.  

[Jim_Iain]

Currently on Le Bellot in the middle of Lake Michigan    I tried Zoom this morning and had no trouble connecting using my iPhone. 

For the teckies.  
 

Speed Test

 

 

I also tried streaming but not enough bandwidth.  

Edited September 12, 2023 by Jim_Iain