So, my parents livr in an area where the only internet available is satellite. It sucks.
However, they also have satellite TV and can watch that no problem.
What’s the difference? Is it just a scale issue where TV has more money and resources compared to satellite internet companies?
In: Technology
They transmit via radio. There’s only so many useful radio frequencies, so this bandwidth is limited.
TV is the same signal sent in one direction to everyone. Internet works in 2 directions and so you are dividing the available radio frequencies by each person using it.
There are ways to make this work better, like splitting the radio beams in different directions that work independently but even then you are likely sharing your beam with others. The more sharing, the slower it gets. If you live somewhere with nobody else around then that’s the best scenario. When there are lots of subscribers around, that’s the worst.
Further to this, each satellite is only going to have hardware that can support a certain amount of traffic. A ground based system is going to see regular improvements. But to improve the hardware on the satellites you are going to have to send up rockets.
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