Telstra goes live with Starlink for homes

Telstra has kicked off its Starlink-powered home broadband service after months of “comprehensive testing”.

The telco first announced its tie-up with Starlink in June last year, and at that time said it expected to launch services before the end of the year.

The $125 a month (plus $599 for hardware) Telstra Satellite Home Internet service targets customers in the NBN Sky Muster footprint with a low-latency, high speed service.

Telstra is offering unlimited data on the service and claims typical peak speeds of 50/10 Mbps.

Both prices and speeds on Telstra are below what a customer pays for, and gets, if they buy direct from Starlink: for $139/month, Starlink offers around 140/30 Mbps typical speeds.

According to Starlink’s service map, latency is location-dependent: it’s typically 25-34ms in Western Australia, 30-38ms in NSW, the ACT, Victoria and Tasmania, 36-42ms in South Australia and Queensland, and 53-76ms in the Northern Territory.

Telstra will supply the service with its standard Smart Modem 3, and if the customer has 4G coverage, that will be used as a backup connection if satellite service is lost.

Any installation involving permanent cabling – on a roof, for example – will also require a licensed cabler for the install.

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AndyC

Andy Curtis is an award-winning security consultant, researcher and public speaker. He has been working in the computer security industry since the early 1990s, having been employed by state and federal government, leading healthcare and banking providers across three continents. He has given talks about computer security for some of the world’s largest companies, worked with law enforcement agencies on investigations into hacking groups, and is a regular voice on TV and radio explaining IT security threats.

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