New user experience in Bulgaria
I ordered the package last month and it arrived faster than expected. The local courier service delivered it flawlessly, I really liked that – looks like they are working with good local delivery companies, which is a good sign. I ordered it for my summer house, which is at a camping site, and nevertheless the driver found me without a problem and handed me the package. Which looks really cool – it’s like a small carton suitcase with minimalistic design and is very easy and pleasant/ergonomic to carry around.
As my summer house is still under construction, I decided to take and try installing the equipment in my wife’s house, which is around 5 miles away – I wasn’t sure if it would work, since as part of the registration when ordering, I provided the camping site address. Well, it did work without any issues. The installation was fast, clear, easy and painless – loved the experience. Once you open the “suitcase” you find some very sleek looking equipment: antenna, router and power supply for the router (and a big LAN-ish cable to connect the antenna to the router).
You scan a QR code on the package and go to the app, where you get guided through the installation steps – very user friendly (and with a very cool minimalistic design).
I decided to put the antenna in the middle of my yard, as I just wanted to test it and didn’t have time to mount it on the house roof or anywhere else. It worked like a charm – I had set up a new Wi-Fi network in the house in a few minutes. The app gave me all kinds of stats related to the connection to the satellites, which was also very cool.
Overall, I am very happy with the purchase and while I got it mainly to test the experience in light of the Kuiper launch (as I already have other internet solutions in place there), I decided I will not be returning the equipment. The cost was not so significant and considering the cool factor, I think it’s a good investment 😊 It cost about USD 400 to get the equipment and I am paying about USD 40 a month for an unlimited (I think) plan.
Some issues I encountered:
- The Wi-Fi router included is not very strong and I didn’t have good connection in my bedroom on the second floor. I’ll probably need to move it somewhere at a more central spot in the house (no problem, as the provided cable to the antenna is quite long), or use mesh extensions.
- I had some questions related to the service, which I couldn’t easily get answered:
- I wanted to check if it’s OK to use the equipment elsewhere, e.g. at my brother’s summer house in Greece, but didn’t get definitive answers – I assume I would be able to, as I guess there is not much control over who logs in from where, but we’ll see – I might try this later in the summer.
- I wasn’t sure about the plan which I’m on: if it’s limited or not, if yes – what the limit is. I ended up asking ChatGPT and googling, as the info available in the Starlink app wasn’t sufficient and clear enough.
- Overall, I found it frustrating that I couldn’t get connected to a person whom to ask my questions to, and even more frustrating that the app was suggesting answers which were not relevant to my questions.
That’s it so far. I keep using this Wi-Fi at the house (except when on the 2nd floor) and it works great for meetings and emailing. I’ll keep you posted on my experiences further.