Uncapped satellite broadband comparison - March 2023

Jan

Jan

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Satellite Internet packages in South Africa — Speeds and prices compared

South Africans living in rural areas without mobile or fixed network coverage can get Internet access through a satellite broadband provider.

Satellite connectivity is expected to play a much bigger role in the global broadband space in the coming years, thanks to the emergence of several low-earth orbit (LEO) operators.
 
I have one of these sat packages, and I can confirm having to do Zoom or Teams, or Whatsup video calls, are difficult. I can't allow the family to use it, because their streaming and video calls blows through the 100Gb in a week. I will not renew in a few months, its not worth it. I have already installed an alternative, basically Poynting signal boosters, and even with Stage 6 loadshedding I still get a reasonable 4G signal.
 
Willie Trombone said:
Starlink is not what this article is about.
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Really?
These include services such as SpaceX’s Starlink, which already has over 3,500 satellites providing coverage in at least 50 countries.

Starlink disrupted the traditional satellite consumer connectivity sector because it offers faster speeds and lower latency than existing services.
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But I understand your point.
The table does not include Starlink.
My bad.
 
Willie Trombone said:
They mention starlink for comparison sake but it's not available to us in SA, but im sure you know that.
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Yes, they get a mention, but the article does not address the elephant in the room:
However, it is unclear when Starlink will become available in South Africa, as SpaceX seems to be encountering some regulatory hurdles with respect to getting clearance from Icasa for a local rollout.
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@Jan can we not get an official response from ICASA as to why exactly they are dilly dallying? All reasons that I have seen are speculation and conjecture, nothing concrete. It would be nice to have them on record, even if they only have racist reasons for blocking it.
 
Starlink really is a game changer when you realise what the competition is.

Prices are insane.

Starlink is meant to be what? R1800pm? With speeds of 100mbps plus.
 
Vorastra said:
Starlink really is a game changer when you realise what the competition is.

Prices are insane.

Starlink is meant to be what? R1800pm? With speeds of 100mbps plus.
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Its going to unfortunately keep bumping into cadres excuses while they try to negotiate bribes..
 
Jacques6077 said:
Nobody is mentioning the extreme high latency of satellite internet
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Except we did. In the article:

"In addition, the latency of existing services is over 600 milliseconds (ms), compared to Starlink’s 40ms to 50ms.

While conventional satellite Internet is not ideal for latency-sensitive use cases like online multiplayer gaming or video conferencing, Starlink is perfectly capable of handling these types of applications."
 
RonSwanson said:
Yes, they get a mention, but the article does not address the elephant in the room:

@Jan can we not get an official response from ICASA as to why exactly they are dilly dallying? All reasons that I have seen are speculation and conjecture, nothing concrete. It would be nice to have them on record, even if they only have racist reasons for blocking it.
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We have asked them, repeatedly. I think it now stands at four to five times, not counting the follow-ups for each query.
 
Willie Trombone said:
I'd pay that in a heartbeat for what you get.
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Yeah exactly, for people who really want faster internet, and have no access, while not completely destroying their bank account, Starlink seems to be way better in value when comparing the other offers.

Why do you need it?

Middle of the bush or no access to fibre or 5G in your part of the city?
 
Are any of these sat internet services mobile? I will be travelling through Africa but need internet wherever I am, Starlink's RV package is very attractive especially when I'm sitting out in the middle of deepest darkest Africa, I will always have signal. But getting the equipment is an issue as I'm on the waiting list for 2 years now, and cannot get the equipment if we're not going to get the service!
 
People aren't thinking realistically about this if they say Starlink has low latency.

It doesn't have the latency of traditional satellite but in South Africa I think you should still expect around 280ms to Europe or even more.

The key is ground stations. From you up to a starlink satellite to a ground station close to JHB will give you around 35-40ms. Then depending on where they put that ground station they will need an NLD from there to Teraco JB1 so they can peer with all the networks locally and from there take the traffic to EU.

If you look at Nigeria. They don't have any ground stations, so the traffic is probably going satellite to satellite to a ground station in Europe and they get around 100Mbps and 150ms latency to London servers. Very poor. Even MTN Mobile in Nigeria gets better speeds and latency to London than that. They also have a 1TB fair use policy probably because of the satellite-to-satellite type connection.
 
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