Not really impressed with Starlink Current Discovery Princess

[hpeabody]

I am currently aboard the Discovery Princess.  I am having issues with the WiFi.  Aside from the very slow speed (Will post below) I find that my ad-blockers are ignored and I am seeing ads.  I have to keep signing in to my main visited sites although I select remember me or keep me signed in.  I am mostly using Chrome.  Here is the speed test at just before 7AM.

 

Edited October 24, 2023 by hpeabody

[lx200gps]

We were on her two weeks ago and saw 2.98 down pretty much constantly, sea day or port day, regardless of time of day. On many ships, certain cabins, due to their physical location, can see worse reception than others. Have you tried the speed test in other locations on the ship?

[Geoffa30]

We had similar speeds on Sky Princess earlier in the year in Northern Europe. It was sufficient to use YouTube at 1080p without issue 🤷‍♂️ 

[Rick&Jeannie]

It's a heck of a lot better than BEFORE Starlink, I promise you!

[Rick&Jeannie]

I remember quite often (location dependent, of course) in getting no better than 0.53 Mbps. 🙄

Pre-Starlink of course.

[BlerkOne]

I'm not impressed, but it works. In port I'm using my hotspot.

[mnocket]

I think some people are comparing Starlink on ships to internet at home rather than internet on ships pre-Starlink.  Even 2Mbps is considerably faster than previous onboard internet and is sufficient to meet most typical user needs.  Obviously Starlink is capable of much faster internet, but what is delivered to users is determined by how the cruise line implements it - i.e. throttling, shipboard infrastructure, etc.  I will take shipboard Starlink over legacy internet any day.  People just like to complain. 

[PescadoAmarillo]

2 hours ago, Geoffa30 said:

We had similar speeds on Sky Princess earlier in the year in Northern Europe. It was sufficient to use YouTube at 1080p without issue 🤷‍♂️ 

We found the same on the Sapphire Princess in Alaska. When I look at the speeds compared to our at home internet (close to 1 GBP), I can’t imagine it will do anything, but when I tried video streaming a bit it did work fine. Of course, it also depends on other factors. 

[hpeabody]

I know not to compare to home, I have many years of pre Starlink experience.  This is no better at all.  This afternoon I just did speedtest again.  It is even "bettter" LOL now with minimal people on board. It seems my expectations were too high.

 

[beg3yrs]

Ad blockers are embedded in your browser and host computer (your tablet, laptop, desktop or whatever) and should be independent of your Internet source.

 

Password managers are also embedded in you browser. If you're using a different computer on the ship than you are at home, the encrypted databases are not in sync and you won't get the same results you do at home. Also, some sites remember your login name using cookies which may be different on the computer you're using on the ship.

[Rick&Jeannie]

4 hours ago, hpeabody said:

I know not to compare to home, I have many years of pre Starlink experience.  This is no better at all.  This afternoon I just did speedtest again.  It is even "bettter" LOL now with minimal people on board. It seems my expectations were too high.

 

This is not "normal" at all... If it were me having this issue I would show that speedtest result to the Internet Cafe staff.  We would all be very curious to see what type of response they give.

[hpeabody]

2 hours ago, beg3yrs said:

Ad blockers are embedded in your browser and host computer (your tablet, laptop, desktop or whatever) and should be independent of your Internet source.

 

Password managers are also embedded in you browser. If you're using a different computer on the ship than you are at home, the encrypted databases are not in sync and you won't get the same results you do at home. Also, some sites remember your login name using cookies which may be different on the computer you're using on the ship.

I understand all this.  This is just the first time I have ever had these things happen on my laptop away from home or on a ship particularly.  I did not used to get ads and my sign in was saved after the first time sometimes having to put it in, but not always.  Very annoying!

[BamaVol]

1 hour ago, hpeabody said:

I understand all this.  This is just the first time I have ever had these things happen on my laptop away from home or on a ship particularly.  I did not used to get ads and my sign in was saved after the first time sometimes having to put it in, but not always.  Very annoying!

1. What sort of speed are you getting outside your cabin?  2. What do the folks in the Internet Cafe say?  

[Carnevale]

We are also currently on Discovery.  In our stateroom our download speed is 2.72 and upload is 0.93.  Compared to other sailings we are happy with this and are lucky that we aren’t having any issues with it.

[satxdiver]

15 hours ago, hpeabody said:

I am currently aboard the Discovery Princess.  I am having issues with the WiFi.  Aside from the very slow speed (Will post below) I find that my ad-blockers are ignored and I am seeing ads.  I have to keep signing in to my main visited sites although I select remember me or keep me signed in.  I am mostly using Chrome.  Here is the speed test at just before 7AM.

 

 

That stinks so much for starlink being fast.  Disappointing.  We will be on the Emerald in a few weeks and will be checking the WiFi speed several times. 

[Cruisintimer]

25 minutes ago, satxdiver said:

 

That stinks so much for starlink being fast.  Disappointing.  We will be on the Emerald in a few weeks and will be checking the WiFi speed several times. 

Had continual problems on the Discovery also this month.  Hoping it is better next month....fingers crossed. 

[Mud_Shark]

We just crossed the Pacific on royal Princess.  There were times when the internet was slow, but there were no times when the internet was not working, so big improvement over past years.

[MissP22]

All the recent speeds I've seen recently approach the speed I was getting (Caribbean) before the installation of Starlink. Of course that was in the early mornings before most people were awake.

 

[Rick&Jeannie]

13 hours ago, Carnevale said:

We are also currently on Discovery.  In our stateroom our download speed is 2.72 and upload is 0.93.  Compared to other sailings we are happy with this and are lucky that we aren’t having any issues with it.

This is more like what should be expected.