StarLink on Riveria, long rant

[pmatawan]

I know others have posted that they had great experience with internet since StarLink was installed, but my experience has been different. At times it's pretty good, but much of the time it's no better then my previous experience on other cruiselines prior to StarLink. This is my first Oceania cruise, but have been on board over 3 weeks. Those of us old enough remember dial up and AOl, brings back those memories as it can take forever for a page to load and many times an app will simply time out. Some have said that this part of the world(Far east), may not have good service, but can someone explain why StarLink internet is poor here. The internet manager said while we were in India that they throttle the speed of cruiseships. He said StarLink doubled their bandwidth,  but now Oceania allows 2 logins per cabin, so maybe that has more to do with it. If it were a week long cruise, good internet would not be a big problem, but I'm on an Grand Voyage and some issues can't wait till I get home to deal with.

With that said, I enjoy the Oceania experience, especially the food. 

 

 

[RetiredLifer]

25 minutes ago, pmatawan said:

I know others have posted that they had great experience with internet since StarLink was installed, but my experience has been different. At times it's pretty good, but much of the time it's no better then my previous experience on other cruiselines prior to StarLink. This is my first Oceania cruise, but have been on board over 3 weeks. Those of us old enough remember dial up and AOl, brings back those memories as it can take forever for a page to load and many times an app will simply time out. Some have said that this part of the world(Far east), may not have good service, but can someone explain why StarLink internet is poor here. The internet manager said while we were in India that they throttle the speed of cruiseships. He said StarLink doubled their bandwidth,  but now Oceania allows 2 logins per cabin, so maybe that has more to do with it. If it were a week long cruise, good internet would not be a big problem, but I'm on an Grand Voyage and some issues can't wait till I get home to deal with.

With that said, I enjoy the Oceania experience, especially the food. 

I am on with you and agree 100% with what you wrote.  In the middle of the night or when most are on shore it is good but the rest of the time it mostly sucks.  What a disappointment.

[thebsinmiss]

We are on the Riviera in June and I hope the internet is better by then. It is a port intensive 10 day cruise so there will be opportunities to use local port based WIFI to connect (potentially riskier) and we will purchase regional esym cards for data only so we can use google maps, self directed tours etc..

 

It is definitely not just cruises where Internet access can be extremely problematic. I recall being at a five star Caribbean resort and the "premium" wifi was horrible.  Had problems sleeping and got up and wandered around at 3 am and found multiple people sitting in the lobby working away in order to get good service. One couple had 3 laptops and 2 cell phones going at the same time. I asked them what was up and they were investment bankers and apparently they couldn't "disconnect"   Didn't ask if they had kids with them "enjoying their vacation" !

 

Internet/WiFi is considered as essential by most people now a days and it is a huge potential sticking point for all cruise lines (or resorts). If you pay for "premium" internet and your expectations are not met it is one of the bigger negatives that end up on all the post boards.

[Psoque]

I do not know exactly what was upgraded on the ship other than just adding Starlink, but for the increased bandwidth/speed to be meaningful, the rest of the path to each device (routers and antennas, mainly) also need to be capable of taking advantaged of the increase bandwidth/speed.  So it is very possible that there is a weak link somewhere in the whole infrastructure.  The bandwidth/speed of the onboard internet is only as fast as the slowest piece of equipment onboard.

[Snaefell3]

57 minutes ago, Psoque said:

The bandwidth/speed of the onboard internet is only as fast as the slowest piece of equipment onboard.

Typically, the choke point is the bandwidth of the ship's satellite downlink.

• You don't get your own downlink, everybody shares a single downlink.

• The cost of downlink *varies*:

  - In port, ships can plug into an inexpensive land-based ISP.

  - ±40º latitude can use low-priced medium-orbit equatorial satellites.

  - Expensive where most land use is via satellite rather than ground link

  - Very expensive in polar areas (unless on polar orbit satellite = StarLink)

• Ships buy more bandwidth when it's cheap and less when expensive.

 

Remember the real estate mantra: "Location, location, location".

 

 

Edited February 2 by Snaefell3

[Jim_Iain]

My understanding is that Starlink is only licensed in 40 countries.  It is not licensed for use in India, Vietnam and China and many other countries.   When a ship with Starlink enter these countries they have to turn off Starlink and revert to the old satellite system.

 

As other have also indicated the basic Wifi is throttled down to about 1.5 M down and .75 upload which is the cause of many webpages that are data intensive fail.   Many report that Cruise Critic often fail due to all the behind the scene advertisement scripts.

[Critically Cruising]

Too many believe that Starlink = home fiber internet.  Wrong.

 

Starlink is just an improvement on what a ship may have had before.  It's not any kind of land based equivalency,

 

I regularly get 900+ Mbps at home, but am under no illusion that I will experience anything close when at sea.  Sadly, too many people think that they will.

[AMHuntFerry]

On our most recent cruise my spouse needed to check in daily with a client due to the client's staffing issues (we usually unplug). It was literally impossible during the day/evening since he had to jump techinical-hurdles accessing the client's servers. He just woke up in the wee hours, checked in, took care of any issues, logged off, and went back to bed.

[1985rz1]

For comparison with Oceania's internet speeds: we're currently on Azamara in Australia.  Azamara does use Starlink, and the fast package tests at 3.9 Mbs download and 0.9 Mbs upload.  The standard package is throttled to 0.150 Mbs download.  I don’t remember the upload speed for yhe standard package.

[ak1004]

Curious why my posts have been deleted??

[pmatawan]

Had dinner with 3 other couples last night. 2 of us are experiencing poor internet service and 2 of us having no issues with intermittent poor service, I wonder why???

[EJL2023]

Just about to depart Sirena. We had a few moments where service was a little slow. Seemed to usually coincide with departing a port, but overall was not an issue for us , but when we are on vacation we really just use it for the basics. 

[pinotlover]

Part of the issues would be resolved if people would only wait until they get back home to post all those pictures.
 

Speaking of which, what does a picture of any food tell you? Would a picture of an Oceania cookie inform another of their poor taste? “ Yep, that’s a cookie, the ship has cookies!” 🙄 Or, here’s my picture of a lobster tail! We won’t talk about how it took a chainsaw to cut it, but the pictures are pretty. Or, the person trying to upload twenty five pictures of a sunrise, and complaining about upload speed! Trust me, people will be equally entranced ( or not) by your all your sunrises photos if you wait until you’re home to post/upload them. Then just think of all the other enjoyment you can be having not wasting time trying to upload a hundred pictures!

😃. Also consider the how it might free up capacity for those poor working stiffs that might really need it! 😇

 

[shepherd really]

I find it amusing when people complain about how poorly the dancing bear dances instead of being impressed that it dances at all.

[ak1004]

32 minutes ago, shepherd really said:

I find it amusing when people complain about how poorly the dancing bear dances instead of being impressed that it dances at all.

 

Well, we were getting over 5Mbps on Princess in 2018, so the technology is there, even before StarLink. And Princess has 3 times more passengers compared to Riviera, not to mention SS. And I'm pretty sure Princess guests post pictures too.. It's all matter of cost, but it looks like the more expensive the cruise line is, the worse the internet is..

 

[Critically Cruising]

1 hour ago, pinotlover said:

Part of the issues would be resolved if people would only wait until they get back home to post all those pictures.

 

Oh so true.  Do the grandkids REALLY want to see them?  Think back to your youth, and the interminable slide shows you sat through of someone else's vacation.  Or the 8mm movies.

 

36 minutes ago, shepherd really said:

I find it amusing when people complain about how poorly the dancing bear dances instead of being impressed that it dances at all.

 

Folks just accept technology without understanding all that goes into making it happen.  I used to say that there needed to be a "drivers test" before anyone could use the "information superhighway"  (as it was often referred)

[Critically Cruising]

2 minutes ago, ak1004 said:

It's all matter of cost, but it looks like the more expensive the cruise line is, the worse the internet is..

 

Not in my experience.  Which should be equally valid.

[ak1004]

27 minutes ago, Critically Cruising said:

 

Oh so true.  Do the grandkids REALLY want to see them?  Think back to your youth, and the interminable slide shows you sat through of someone else's vacation.  Or the 8mm movies.

 

 

Folks just accept technology without understanding all that goes into making it happen.  I used to say that there needed to be a "drivers test" before anyone could use the "information superhighway"  (as it was often referred)

 

How about someone like me who posts pictures for their 90 years parents? They don't have smartphone to talk via WhatsApp, but they have ipads, and this is the only way for me to let them know that we are fine.

 

Why to judge people?

[shepherd really]

35 minutes ago, ak1004 said:

 

Well, we were getting over 5Mbps on Princess in 2018, so the technology is there, even before StarLink. And Princess has 3 times more passengers compared to Riviera, not to mention SS. And I'm pretty sure Princess guests post pictures too.. It's all matter of cost, but it looks like the more expensive the cruise line is, the worse the internet is..

 

It's all relative to personal experience and expectations.  I live in a rural area and was dependent on satellite internet until less than two years ago, when I got fiber optic cable.  The slow shipboard speeds just don't phase me after 15 years of really crappy service.  Plus, I remember 2400 baud modems.  That was slow.  

 

Is there room for improvement? Of course, and for those who need it, I hope it improves.  I'll muddle along until it does.

[Jim_Iain]

11 hours ago, pmatawan said:

Had dinner with 3 other couples last night. 2 of us are experiencing poor internet service and 2 of us having no issues with intermittent poor service, I wonder why???

 

Would be interesting to run tests at the same location and compare results.   Not knowing how you ran your test,   I suspect that if the tests are being run from your rooms it may be due to the distance of the room to the Access Points (router extensions).  

 

Also if testing use the same speed test programs.   I find different programs show different results.

 

[Jim_Iain]

1 hour ago, shepherd really said:

I find it amusing when people complain about how poorly the dancing bear dances instead of being impressed that it dances at all.

 

I love Glass Half Full type people.

[shepherd really]

11 minutes ago, Jim_Iain said:

 

I love Glass Half Full type people.

It doesn't come naturally to me, but I'm trying to mellow with age.

[pinotlover]

48 minutes ago, ak1004 said:

 

How about someone like me who posts pictures for their 90 years parents? They don't have smartphone to talk via WhatsApp, but they have ipads, and this is the only way for me to let them know that we are fine.

 

Why to judge people?

Remember the song:

 

Hello Mutter;

Hello Father;

Entertaining, a searching Party

 

You didn’t need 20 pictures of the searching party to relay you’re doing fine! 😂

 

Pictures devour capacity.

[Vallesan]

40 minutes ago, Jim_Iain said:

 

Would be interesting to run tests at the same location and compare results.   Not knowing how you ran your test,   I suspect that if the tests are being run from your rooms it may be due to the distance of the room to the Access Points (router extensions).  

 

Also if testing use the same speed test programs.   I find different programs show different results.

 

Come on …. this is a HOLIDAY!

[Jim_Iain]

18 minutes ago, Vallesan said:

Come on …. this is a HOLIDAY!

 

Yes and the OP was wondering why.   If you can't add anything constructive possibly you should just move on instead of being condescending.