Abysmal Internet speed on Silver Muse

[markandjie]

First time Silversea cruiser here. Just embarked the Muse in Seward, AK. Was curious internet speed on the included plan and found very disappointing results, despite the fact it's apparently Starlink. Was getting 10-20x this result just a month ago on the SB Venture in remote Greenland, also with the included plan. Is this normal for SS?

 

[bitob]

I’m on silver moon which has starlink

 

flawless internet for 3 weeks, even in remote places 

 

no speed issues

Edited August 4, 2023 by bitob

[Miss Merry]

Just disembarked the Spirit.  Internet was terrible with the new supplier.  Couldn’t FaceTime or watch even short videos which were blocked.  The old internet was much better.

MM

[bitob]

1 hour ago, Miss Merry said:

Just disembarked the Spirit.  Internet was terrible with the new supplier.  Couldn’t FaceTime or watch even short videos which were blocked.  The old internet was much better.

MM

Did u use a vpn?  You need a vpn on most cruise ships to do any of that 

[Miss Merry]

Yes, with and without VPN.  Never had a problem until this time.

[drron29]

A quick search reveals no reports of Starlink being installed on the Muse or Spirit When we cruised on the Moon in March Starlink had only just been activated. Since March I believe the Muse has only been in Asia and Alaska so possibly still not installed.

The old internet service was rubbish. Starlink even without the premium was much better.

[markandjie]

6 hours ago, drron29 said:

A quick search reveals no reports of Starlink being installed on the Muse or Spirit When we cruised on the Moon in March Starlink had only just been activated. Since March I believe the Muse has only been in Asia and Alaska so possibly still not installed.

The old internet service was rubbish. Starlink even without the premium was much better.

 

The speed test site I used identified my provider as starlink, so pretty sure it's installed on Muse. 

[drron29]

Just make sure it is activated though the speed test saying Starlink suggests it is. I certainly hope so as our next 3 cruises are on the Moon.

The other possible reason everybody got on to the internet having just boarded. I would have problems on sea days with everyone online so used to go to lunch early and go online as soon as finished and then usually an hour of better speeds.

When on the Moon I did a virtualy live cruise report. 54 days and at the end of the cruise was only 4 days behind even though very photo intensive as you can see.

 

[Miss Merry]

I’m sure when I did a speed test Starlink was the provider.  The problem wasn’t intermittent but all the time for two weeks.

[canderson]

1 hour ago, Miss Merry said:

I’m sure when I did a speed test Starlink was the provider.  The problem wasn’t intermittent but all the time for two weeks.

Did anyone ask IT what the issue was, and if so, what was the reply?

[econprofessor]

It has been my experience that the internet in Alaska is spotty.  This is when on a ship or on land.

 

Vikki

[canderson]

5 hours ago, econprofessor said:

It has been my experience that the internet in Alaska is spotty.  This is when on a ship or on land.

 

Vikki

Traditionally, this was because anything that far north (or S in S America, similarly) is at a really acute angle to the equatorial medium Earth orbits are where all of the geostationary satellites live that used to manage all of this data. 

 

With Starlink, this shouldn't be the case UNLESS they still haven't done a sufficient job of building out ground stations up there.

 

[markandjie]

It really feels that SS has decided to cap internet speeds for the included plan. I hear you on issues with internet in Alaska, but there are fewer Starlink satellites over Alaska than there are over Greenland, and in Greenland on the SB Venture we routinely got 10-25 mbps, whereas here I'm getting 1.5-1.75 mbps every time. Feels like SS has decided to cap speed on the free plan (in addition to blocking sites like YouTube) whereas SB has decided to take the approach of blocking sites but not capping speeds.

[canderson]

16 hours ago, markandjie said:

It really feels that SS has decided to cap internet speeds for the included plan. I hear you on issues with internet in Alaska, but there are fewer Starlink satellites over Alaska than there are over Greenland, and in Greenland on the SB Venture we routinely got 10-25 mbps, whereas here I'm getting 1.5-1.75 mbps every time. Feels like SS has decided to cap speed on the free plan (in addition to blocking sites like YouTube) whereas SB has decided to take the approach of blocking sites but not capping speeds.

There's little service yet over Greenland, either - about on par with Alaska at present.  The current northernmost orbits peter out at about 54~55 degrees north.

 

That said, there are ground stations in Ketchikan, Fairbanks, Nome and Kuparuk in Alaska, and none yet in Greenland.  Nominally, given the ground stations, service should be marginally better in several of the Alaskan cruise ports than anywhere in Greenland, so no excuse for poor service on that count.

 

For 'consumer' purposes, one of the better sites for observation of the current StarLink constellation and ground station installations can be found here > https://satellitemap.space

 

 

[PaulMCO]

You just have to look at the coverage and the number of sats over Alaska.   Near ZERO  (the long string are recently launched but not yet operational)

 

Spotty coverage and of course everyone trying to use the same one when there is coverage.

[markandjie]

On 8/7/2023 at 10:26 AM, canderson said:

There's little service yet over Greenland, either - about on par with Alaska at present.  The current northernmost orbits peter out at about 54~55 degrees north.

 

Yes, sorry, I mis-typed in my comment above. I meant that Starlink should be worse over Greenland than over Alaska.

 

28 minutes ago, PaulMCO said:

You just have to look at the coverage and the number of sats over Alaska.   Near ZERO  (the long string are recently launched but not yet operational)

 

 

Agreed, but I was on SB Venture a month ago in Greenland with MUCH faster download speeds on the included plan. This morning in Ketchikan I upgraded on the Muse to the premium internet and I'm still only getting 8-10 mpbs download speed, about 1/2 to 1/3 what we saw in Greenland on the Venture.

Edited August 8, 2023 by markandjie

[D. B.]

I will be on Muse for an Alaska Cruise next year and I hope this is fixed by then.

[PaulMCO]

On 8/8/2023 at 5:56 PM, markandjie said:

Agreed, but I was on SB Venture a month ago in Greenland with MUCH faster download speeds on the included plan. This morning in Ketchikan I upgraded on the Muse to the premium internet and I'm still only getting 8-10 mpbs download speed, about 1/2 to 1/3 what we saw in Greenland on the Venture.

 

But then again you and Venture were probably the only ones using the available bandwidth.  No locals using it as no ground stations

 

In Alaska you have residents plus other ships that have been outfitted with Starlink.  Regent Encore outfitted plus other NCL and RCCL ships too.

[irvington]

I'll be on Muse next month and can report back. I'm really hoping I will be able to use the internet for work.

[jwsfun]

How was it Irvington???

[drron29]

I am on the Muse now. At times very good and I can do several posts with many photos in a short time and sometimes quite slow.

That was particularly true on the sea day as obviously a lot were connected.

[texanaust]

Internet speed was excellent on the Muse from Vancouver to Tokyo.  Video Skype worked fine for almost the entire voyage.  Only one afternoon were there issues.