Starlink Mini

[Mal Reynolds]

Hardware looks great. 25-40 watts, plenty of bandwidth, smaller footprint. Pretty high price. https://www.starlink.com/specifications?spec=5

Looks like a great hardware solution for most of us.

Service limited to some Central American countries and invite only to certain US Residential customers as an add-on.
https://support.starlink.com/?topic=...9-40f0084d1926

No roam, no ocean use.

What a mess.

[Statistical]

I think like everything else it will work on a boat and eventually sold with standalone mobile plans globally.

Right now due to limited availability SpaceX is using it as an upsell. To get customers who are paying $120 to start paying $150 (residential + mini mobile).

If someone owns a boat and currently using Starlink for home internet they walked into a deal though.

[mvweebles]

Originally Posted by Statistical

I think like everything else it will work on a boat.

Right now SpaceX is using it as an upsell. To get customers who are paying $120 to start paying $150 (residential + mini mobile).

If someone owns a boat and currently using Starlink for home internet they walked into a deal though.

Caveat being usage is capped at 50GB....

https://www.cnbc.com/2024/06/20/spac...ndroidappshare

[FlyingScot]

Originally Posted by mvweebles

Caveat being usage is capped at 50GB....

https://www.cnbc.com/2024/06/20/spac...ndroidappshare

For the add on USA plans.

Doesn't appear so for the Guatemala plans, and presumably the others Central American plans.

[wholybee]

It doesn't seem to be smaller or different enough than the actuated dish to make a switch from that worth it. I might choose it if I were buying new and it was available.

[smac999]

Originally Posted by wholybee

It doesn't seem to be smaller or different enough than the actuated dish to make a switch from that worth it. I might choose it if I were buying new and it was available.

it's like 1/4 the size, half the power, and dc powered...

[Statistical]

Originally Posted by smac999

it's like 1/4 the size, half the power, and dc powered...

Yeah if one isn't impressed not sure what it would take to be impressed. Something the size of a watch which uses zero power and is free?

I do think SpaceX will eventually made them universally available. Seems a solid option for small boats looking to save power and space. Would also be nice if SpaceX made a data limited lower cost standalone roam plan. Like Roam Lite $70/mo and 10 GB of data (additional data $2/GB).

[FlyingScot]

Originally Posted by wholybee

It doesn't seem to be smaller or different enough than the actuated dish to make a switch from that worth it. I might choose it if I were buying new and it was available.

Not sure what you were expecting. We have the actuated that we never mounted on the boat, just keep on the foredeck. It has survived there even through some pretty rough conditions off Santa Marta Colombia. But the dream was always a smaller DC powered flat mountable dish. They have come through with this!
We ordered one and I look forward to comparing them. We will stick the other one in the back pack case as a spare or maybe sell it and just buy another mini as a spare. $225 delivered in Guatemala is a great deal IMO.

I wish the new one had WiFi 6, but maybe it won't matter for our use case.

We leave ours own 24/7 so the reduced power consumption will be likely be very noticeable.

[wholybee]

Originally Posted by smac999

it's like 1/4 the size, half the power, and dc powered...

248 sq inches vs 119 sq inches. It's smaller for sure. But much larger than 1/4 the size. It's a bit larger than half the size.

50-75W vs 25-40W. So half the power. But not as huge a decrease for those that have converted the standard actuated to DC.

Like I said, if you already have the Standard Actuated, you aren't gaining much. What did I expect? Amazon's Kuiper is claiming an antenna of 7 inches by 7 inches, or 49 square inches. So something closer to that.

[anotherT34C]

Interesting… for those of us who maintain a land based home and cruise coastally on weekends and summer, this might be an attractive package.

[FlyingScot]

As far as sizes go:
Standard Actuated: 0.155 sqm
Standard: 0.228 sqm
Mini: 0.077 sqm

So half the size of the actuated and 1/3 the size of the new "standard".

Weight without base or kickstand:
Standard actuated: 2.9 kg
Standard: 2.9 kg
Mini: 1.1 kg*

*Mini includes the router.
Router weighs 1 kg on the actuated and 0.57 kg on the new "standard".

So less than 1/3 the weight of the previous and current models.

Power consumption appears to be way less as well without replacing the router, hacking the device or otherwise voiding the warranty.

I'd say overall it is a hell of a deal for $200 USD.

My big question is whether performance will be affected feeding it 12-14v direct. I think the only risk is if you have non Lithium batteries as it could drop out on low voltage. Time will tell.

[Dockhead]

Originally Posted by FlyingScot

As far as sizes go:
Standard Actuated: 0.155 sqm
Standard: 0.228 sqm
Mini: 0.077 sqm

So half the size of the actuated and 1/3 the size of the new "standard".

Weight without base or kickstand:
Standard actuated: 2.9 kg
Standard: 2.9 kg
Mini: 1.1 kg*

*Mini includes the router.
Router weighs 1 kg on the actuated and 0.57 kg on the new "standard".

So less than 1/3 the weight of the previous and current models.

Power consumption appears to be way less as well without replacing the router, hacking the device or otherwise voiding the warranty.

I'd say overall it is a hell of a deal for $200 USD.

My big question is whether performance will be affected feeding it 12-14v direct. I think the only risk is if you have non Lithium batteries as it could drop out on low voltage. Time will tell.

Just feed it with a buck-boost voltage stabilizer.


Won't be a problem for 24v boats.

[Seafarer7]

Originally Posted by Mal Reynolds

No roam, no ocean use.

What a mess.

The “Mini Service” terms of use below seem to indicate one can upgrade service to Mobile Regional, which with its ability to support opt-in to purchase Priority or Mobile Priority Data, should allow roaming and ocean use …


From Starlink:
With the Starlink "Mini" Service Plan:

There are no data caps and no speed caps
Speeds should range from 50 - 100 Mbps (as compared to 150 - 250 Mbps for the Standard service plan, see specific Standard download speeds here)
In-motion and ocean use is not allowed
Pause Service feature is not supported
Ability to opt-in to purchase Priority or Mobile Priority Data is not supported
Users can only upgrade to Mobile Regional, and no other service plans

[Martin9700]

Just my .02 but I don't think Mini will ever be that good for boats. The bigger dishes have the ability to track the satellites much better then a little tiny one. With the boat rocking, trying to hit a moving target the dish will need the extra surface area to keep a lock.

Now, if you're camping at the state park that little thing will be fine as long as you can find some open sky and having the router integrated in the dish makes it ideal for overlanders where space is a lot more limited.

I wouldn't stress on the prices right now. Elon has a LONG history of making his early adopters pay a premium price before lowering it for general consumers. Might take a year or two but it usually comes down.

[Statistical]

Originally Posted by Martin9700

Just my .02 but I don't think Mini will ever be that good for boats. The bigger dishes have the ability to track the satellites much better then a little tiny one. With the boat rocking, trying to hit a moving target the dish will need the extra surface area to keep a lock.

Now, if you're camping at the state park that little thing will be fine as long as you can find some open sky and having the router integrated in the dish makes it ideal for overlanders where space is a lot more limited.

I wouldn't stress on the prices right now. Elon has a LONG history of making his early adopters pay a premium price before lowering it for general consumers. Might take a year or two but it usually comes down.

The satellites are moving along at a few thousands mph even if the dish is stationary. For years the official word from SpaceX was you needed the high performance dish for it to work in motion and the smaller standard dish worked fine.

I doubt the mini has worse tracking abilities. Now it may have a narrower field of view. HP can see 160 deg of the sky, standard 145 deg. Maybe mini is less but the flipside is each year starlink puts up more and more sats. There are now usually many overhead at one time.