from Hacker News

Starlink Mini brings space internet to backpackers

by iamphilrae on 6/21/24, 9:45 AM with 70 comments

• by whicks on 6/21/24, 12:41 PM

  As a technologist, this is an incredible development.

  As a backpacker and avid hiker, no thank you. I go outside to intentionally avoid screens and the internet/connected world. Fortunately I can just not buy this and it won’t have an impact on my life.

  Another interesting thing I’m curious about is if this would provide any benefits to SAR crews over traditional sat phones. I could potentially see some benefits there, maybe, but I guess time will tell.

• by devit on 6/21/24, 12:17 PM

  So basically, you can carry:

  - FlexSolar 40W panel: 1.35kg

  - Nitecore NB20000 ~75Wh battery: 300g

  - Starlink Mini: 1.1kg

  - Smartphone: 250g

  For 3kg you have something that should give 2-3 hours of Internet usage on an average EU/USA good weather day (assuming 20% solar panel for 10 hours = 80Wh/day, 25-35W power usage of Starlink Mini + smartphone).

  For each extra 1.65kg you get an additional 2-3 hours, resulting in 7.95kg for 8-12 hours, 11.25kg for 12-16 hours.

  Not bad, but not good either.

• by tosh on 6/21/24, 10:32 AM

  Will be very interesting once they roll them out unbundled and with more than 50gb/month of data.

  (right now you only get a Starlink Mini if you are an early Starlink customer and it requires an existing residential subscription)

• by lxgr on 6/21/24, 1:15 PM

  Amazing! In some way, this was the obvious next step (Starlink clearly had some capacity headroom for this), but still, this basically blows all existing competitors out of the water.

  I wonder how much more bandwidth this uses compared to their stationary terminals. There's almost certainly a power/size vs. data rate trade-off here, which can explain why they don't offer it standalone in the US yet (the reasoning probably being that people will use their more efficient larger antenna at home most of the time), but do have standalone plans in areas where they probably have less users overall.

• by JumpCrisscross on 6/21/24, 10:13 AM

  “In the US, Starlink Mini is an add-on to Residential plans — at least for now. The Mini kit costs $599 which is $100 more than the standard dish, and will cost an extra $30 per month to add the Mini Roam service to existing $120 Residential plans. That gives Starlink Mini users up to 50GB of mobile data each month, with the option to purchase more for $1 per GB…”

• by alexpc201 on 6/21/24, 12:11 PM

  Becomes abstract. In the short term, you will be able to use your iPhone 17 to utilize Starlink satellites. They have already done tests with the iPhone 15.

• by bookofjoe on 6/21/24, 9:12 PM

  Starlink nano in 2030 iPhone 22?

• by wslh on 6/21/24, 10:50 AM

  How that works battery / consumption wise?

• by cjk2 on 6/21/24, 11:33 AM

  Regular backpacker here. I don't want or need this.

  Literally we all use eSIMs and just have downtime occasionally, which is partially the point of it.