On 3/2/2023 11:45 AM, Mike Smith VE9AA wrote:
Has anyone used Starlink to remote into their contest station?
Hi Mike,
I can't respond to the remote contesting part of the question, but I've
been using Starlink for more than a year. I bought the system as backup
for Comcast, which had a long history of lousy power backup. My QTH is a
very challenging one for Starlink, because the 250-275 ft redwoods that
surround be give it a rather limited view of the sky. That causes
relatively frequent dropouts. No problem for anything that's buffered,
like browsing, music, even high res video. NOT good with anything
interactive like VOIP, Zoom, etc., because those apps will think you're
gone and disconnect.
Here's a third-party app that will show you what birds are covering you.
I don't recall how I plugged in my qth -- I wandered around meuns for a
while. :) I'm currently covered most of the time by 6-9 birds, but
they're mostly fairly low vertical elevation angle, so they don't get
through the trees. When I started out, it was more like 3-5. Down time
now is on the order of 8-10%, roughly half what it was when I started
with it. The difference is the many additional birds they launch. I get
those statistics from the Starlink app running on my phone that queries
the Starlink unit.
https://satellitemap.space/?constellation=starlink
Several neighbors, all but one of them hams, have far less obstruction,
and are quite happy. I'm happy too, for my backup needs. (We have no
cell coverage here, thanks to the "tin hat" brigade").
73, Jim K9YC
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