Rant: Starlink vs DSL debate in my county has me confused

I live outside of Laramie and two neighbors got Starlink last spring while I stuck with our local DSL. One of them claims their download speed jumped from 12 Mbps to 150 Mbps in just three months. The other neighbor says the service drops out when it rains hard and they miss the steady connection. My DSL has been 10 Mbps for five years without any drama. Has anyone else tried both and seen a real difference where you live?

3 comments

3 Comments

skyler_adams24d agoMost Upvoted

Honestly, did your neighbor with the good Starlink tell you what happens to his downloads when the wind kicks up? A buddy of mine near Cheyenne got Starlink and swore it was a game changer until a heavy snowstorm knocked his signal out for like four hours. He spent that whole time staring at his phone trying to get a text out on one bar of LTE, while my DSL just chugged along at 8 Mbps the whole time. So yeah, speed is cool but reliability is something else.

the_olivia1mo ago

...wait so your neighbor went from buffering to blazing fast and the other one's complaining about a little rain? Sounds like the classic tradeoff between "it works" and "it works when there's not a cloud in the sky." I swear, people out here act like losing internet for ten minutes during a downpour is the end of the world, meanwhile we've all survived on dial up that sounded like a robot having a seizure for years. My DSL never wowed me but it also never made me want to throw my router out the window... can't say the same for some of these satellite horror stories I've heard.

skyler_adams1mo agoMost Upvoted

Don't you miss the days when internet just worked (even if it was slow)?