SpaceX Asserts 5G Would 'Blow Out' Satellite Users In 12 GHz Band (fiercewireless.com) 53
Monica Alleven writes via Fierce Wireless: So much for the "win-win-win" scenario that Dish Network envisioned for the 12 GHz band. Dish and fellow MVDDS licensee RS Access have argued that the 12 GHz band can be used by both satellite players like SpaceX's Starlink and by companies like Dish that want to use it for 5G, all for the public's benefit. SpaceX on Tuesday submitted its own analysis (PDF) of the effect of terrestrial mobile deployment on non-geostationary orbit fixed satellite service (NGSO FSS) downlink operations. The upshot: The SpaceX study shows terrestrial mobile service would cause harmful interference to SpaceX's Starlink terminals in the 12.2-12.7 GHz band more than 77% of the time, resulting in full outages 74% of the time.
Although entities like RS Access note that SpaceX has access to plenty of other spectrum to accomplish its broadband mission, SpaceX insists that the 12 GHz band has become one of the most important and intensely used spectrum bands for Americans who depend on satellite services. In fact, SpaceX said it depends on the 12 GHz band for the workhorse frequencies in critical downlink services to serve Americans "in every corner of the nation." [...] SpaceX would like the FCC to drop the 12 GHz proceeding, but Dish and RS Access have been urging the FCC for years to change the rules so that their MVDDS licenses can be used for two-way 5G services. In response to SpaceX's submission, the 5G for 12 GHz Coalition, issued the following statement: "We understand that SpaceX has -- after 18 months and both a robust comment and reply period -- just filed its own in-house technical submission to the 12 GHz proceeding. Our engineers and technical experts are reviewing the filing in depth and remain committed to working in good faith with the FCC and stakeholders to ensure that the American public is able to reap the immense benefits of 5G services in this band."
Although entities like RS Access note that SpaceX has access to plenty of other spectrum to accomplish its broadband mission, SpaceX insists that the 12 GHz band has become one of the most important and intensely used spectrum bands for Americans who depend on satellite services. In fact, SpaceX said it depends on the 12 GHz band for the workhorse frequencies in critical downlink services to serve Americans "in every corner of the nation." [...] SpaceX would like the FCC to drop the 12 GHz proceeding, but Dish and RS Access have been urging the FCC for years to change the rules so that their MVDDS licenses can be used for two-way 5G services. In response to SpaceX's submission, the 5G for 12 GHz Coalition, issued the following statement: "We understand that SpaceX has -- after 18 months and both a robust comment and reply period -- just filed its own in-house technical submission to the 12 GHz proceeding. Our engineers and technical experts are reviewing the filing in depth and remain committed to working in good faith with the FCC and stakeholders to ensure that the American public is able to reap the immense benefits of 5G services in this band."
That ship has sailed (Score:2)
That ship has sailed. The precedent is currently that DiSH Network has bandwidth adjacent to both Sirius Satellite Radio and XM Satellite Radio. They also have terrestrial spectrum in C-band, near traditional Big Ugly Dish satellite TV and aircraft altimeters.
Re:That ship has sailed (Score:4, Insightful)
Re: (Score:2, Interesting)
Like most government problems, this one will probably be settled by whatever side spends the most money.
The side willing to spend more likely has more potential profit, which means more people willing to pay for the service they offer, which means more utilitarian benefit.
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Like most government problems, this one will probably be settled by whatever side spends the most money.
The side willing to spend more likely has more potential profit, which means more people willing to pay for the service they offer, which means more utilitarian benefit.
Maybe. However, often the entrenched, incumbent companies have more current money to spend, along with an interest in preventing any new disruptive technologies from gaining economic or legal traction.
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No.
The side which has more money at hand now.
After that there is no telling what the profit/utilitarian benefit of the other side could have been.
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Like most government problems, this one will probably be settled by whatever side spends the most money.
As opposed to market problems, which are usually settled by whatever side spends the most money.
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This one is complicated because FCC is one of SpaceX's largest customers and is theoretically saving the FCC a metric shit ton of money on rural internet subsidies.
So this is one of those areas where it's not necessarily which side spends the most money but which side saves the govt the most money.
The FCC doesn't really care about urban 5G. There's already AT&T, Verizon and T-Mobile all rolling out extensive cellular coverage. I don't offer DISH a lot of hope here.
Lightsquared (Score:5, Informative)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
I'm sure in both cases someone thought they could get a bargain by buying cheaper spectrum and then getting the FCC allow them to use it. No different than buying cheap land with the plans of getting it re-zoned to make it more valuable. Might be possible, but also a good chance of pissing off the neighbors.
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Uh no, it's not the same. This is the equivalent of you buying commercial zoned land and someone tries to get it re-zoned under you after you already built most of your business/office. Dish and MV Access are the ones who want the re-zoning.
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When they acquired it they knew there are proceedings that may make their intended use impractical:
> In April 2021, the FCC granted a license modification for SpaceX, but it made a point of saying it was conditional on future actions at the commission, “including but not limited to the 12 GHz proceeding,” and therefore “SpaceX proceeds at its own risk” in terms of what it does in the 12 GHz band.
So to continue the analogy they bought the land while rezoning proceedings were alread
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So to continue the analogy
This is Slashdot, our analogies are suppose to be of the car variety.
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So how much Nissan Leaf power (Score:2)
Typical Nissan Leaf : 80 kW
Typical 5G phone TX power : 1W.
Typical amount of 5G phones that make starlink inpractical : 100 millions
So it takes about 1250 Nissan Leafs (or Nissan Leaves ?) to make starlink impractical.
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When they acquired it they knew there are proceedings that may make their intended use impractical:
> In April 2021, the FCC granted a license modification for SpaceX, but it made a point of saying it was conditional on future actions at the commission, “including but not limited to the 12 GHz proceeding,” and therefore “SpaceX proceeds at its own risk” in terms of what it does in the 12 GHz band.
So to continue the analogy they bought the land while rezoning proceedings were already under way and were warned that if they build something they may have problems later.
Well, the logical course of action in your zoning analogy would be for the council evaluating the petition to step back and reassess from the beginning the value proposition at hand then. Rezoning isn't typically approved if it would interfere with large productive areas of commercial activity.
In this case, you have a couple of minor to nonexistent players in the phone industry hoping to "repurpose" spectrum they got on the cheap into something far more valuable, probably so they can either sell it or sell
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The main problem with Lightsquared is they were using frequencies immediately adjacent to the GPS L1 signal. Because the RF front-ends on most GPS receivers aren't all that selective, and GPS signals are (very) weak, there was a strong possibility that the terrestrial lightsquared signals would cause significant interference to GPS receivers, especially older ones.
Interesting case (Score:5, Informative)
Both parties make some good points
“Even aside from their meritless technical claims, neither Dish nor RS Access can make a case that remotely justifies commission complicity in their attempted spectrum arbitrage,” SpaceX wrote in its June 21 filing. “As has been widely documented, Dish has never lived up to its repeated promises to deploy a new terrestrial networking using the exclusive licenses already stored up in its warehouses – the commission simply cannot gift more spectrum to any operator with this track record of broken promises and stranded consumers. For over a decade, Dish has promised and failed to timely deploy a network using its licenses in the 700 MHz, AWS-4, AWS H Block, AWS-3 and 600 MHz.”
If Dish is sitting on spectrum it was granted and not utilizing it they should be made to return it so it can be leased out again. I am even ok with a partial refund of the money they bought it with, hey shit happens but spectrum is given out for a reason.
SpaceX would like the FCC to drop the 12 GHz proceeding, but Dish and RS Access have been urging the FCC for years to change the rules so that their MVDDS licenses can be used for two-way 5G services.
In April 2021, the FCC granted a license modification for SpaceX, but it made a point of saying it was conditional on future actions at the commission, “including but not limited to the 12 GHz proceeding,” and therefore “SpaceX proceeds at its own risk” in terms of what it does in the 12 GHz band.
Seems like SpaceX should have held back bit on building a big dependence on spectrum they knew could essentially go away.
From a little googling it seems like 12GHz 5G is a Line-Of-Sight signal, so if someone is within range of a strong enough 12GHz signal to disrupt a stellite signal are there really any advantages of using satellite? People in the rural areas would use it precisely because they don't have those signals. Would be great if theres a way to give people the choice still.
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Re: Interesting case (Score:2)
No? That might be the courts conclusion, I said prescriptively I would prefer the opposite, a "use it or lose it" approach.
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Yes, the advantage is competition.
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If you're close enough to an area with 12GHz cellular coverage, you probably have cable and fiber Internet options. I suppose satellite is competition too, but not a very good choice.
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Seems like SpaceX should have held back bit on building a big dependence on spectrum they knew could essentially go away.
Ownership is 9/10ths of the law. There's a big difference between re-purposing an empty spectrum and re-purposing used spectrum. Holding back would not have done them any favours.
From a little googling it seems like 12GHz 5G is a Line-Of-Sight signal, so if someone is within range of a strong enough 12GHz signal to disrupt a stellite signal are there really any advantages of using satellite?
In most of the western world, no. In America, land of the "you have the choice of only one ISP you worthless maggot, pay up or get cut off" yeah there are real advantages.
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In America, land of the "you have the choice of only one ISP you worthless maggot, pay up or get cut off" yeah there are real advantages.
We also have the option to start our own ISP that includes both blackjack and hookers.
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Additionally, this also only applies to the US... The licensing of that part of Ku-Band varies worldwide.
In some parts of the world, the downlink for Ku-Band satellite is 10.950GHz to 11.7GHz, in North America it's 11.7GHz to 12.2GHz, and in other parts of the world, the downlink from geostationary satellite is the aforementioned 12.2GHz to 12.7GHz. The only thing that is consistent worldwide is that the uplink band is generally in the 14Ghz to 14.5Ghz, dropping to 13.750GHz if you're in extended band.
Space
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12GHz 5G is a Line-Of-Sight signal, so if someone is within range of a strong enough 12GHz signal to disrupt a stellite signal are there really any advantages of using satellite?
The satellite is on one end of that communication. And unlike traditional satellite communication which uses physical dishes to direct signals everybody is using phased arrays now for phones and panels. The result is tons of sidelobe interference.
If dish could guarantee that their antennas were only pointed below the horizon and every phone only transmitted sufficiently low on the horizon it would work fine.
But if you have a cell that's 15mi / 15mi wide you could have a city full of 5G customers on their
Never saw (Score:2)
Extortion (Score:1)
We can't have nice things (Score:5, Insightful)
Even if you're evil and don't care about rural broadband, you do realize Starlink would enable broadband on flights and on cruise ships globally right? Right now flights are pretty boring.
Existing broadband providers want to see Starlink die! They can see themselves fucked. Ever tried to corner a rabid possum? They are acting out the same way. I mean put yourself in their shoes. Existing broadband providers can't keep fucking people over for a service that should cost pennies, not to mention steal taxpayer money from the federal money for "universal broadband"! They've taken tens of billions for rural wired broadband and haven't dug a single trench. No way we'd have broadband in 60% of the landmass of America (and the world) without Starlink.
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And yes possums can carry rabies in spite of the myth that they can't get it. It's very rare, but they do get it.
Re: We can't have nice things (Score:2)
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They snuck up on it while it was playing possum.
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The world looks at the nasty mess that is the US consumer internet service provision industry and recoils in horror, so don't expect them to willingly run headlong into that mess when an American company offers global internet coverage...
Starlink has its uses but it should not be the worlds major supplier of internet connectivity.
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What's "major supplier", though?
Geographical coverage? Subscribers?
Starlink isn't competitive in dense-population areas with access to fibre - it's aimed at people whose only options are DSL, WISP, or geo-stationary satellite.
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Flights and cruise ships already have satellite broadband. Starlink is theoretically faster.
much much, much cheaper. (Score:2)
And, more importantly, much much, much cheaper.
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Right now flights are pretty boring.
Huh? What do you mean boring? You don't bring movies, music, books, or games onto flights? You don't fire up a Nintendo switch and battle it out with your partner?
Do all your endorphins come just from posting shit on Slashdot? Well I have news for you, we already can do that. The last flights and cruises I've taken all had internet, none of which was provided by Starlink.
re: in flight Internet (Score:2)
I'm amazed you had any luck using what passes for "wifi access" on a plane flight!
Granted, it's been a few years since I was on a plane. But at my previous job, we had a pretty highly mobile workforce and people were ALWAYS trying to do work on their flights to have ready when they landed. I.T. got endless support calls wanting us to fix their issues, such as wireless refusing to even allow them to sign in to the in-flight wifi's SSID, or utterly useless connections that dropped every 5-10 minutes and barel
I have Starlink (Score:3)
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DirecTV? (Score:2)
Thanks (Score:1)
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SpaceX has conditional license, so those proceedings can effectively invalidate it.
>In April 2021, the FCC granted a license modification for SpaceX, but it made a point of saying it was conditional on future actions at the commission, “including but not limited to the 12 GHz proceeding,” and therefore “SpaceX proceeds at its own risk” in terms of what it does in the 12 GHz band.
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Don't assume. Pay. (Score:2)
Don't assume. Pay.
Value varies (Score:2)
The value of a frequency isn't a constant. SpaceX wants others to move for it, but doesn't want to move for others. It has to be a two-way street.
5G: Most Destructive Communications Protocol (Score:2)
Zoiks! A talking snake! (Score:2)
"for 5G, all for the public's benefit"
And if you believe this you also believe
"I won't cum in your mouth"
"I'll still respect you in the morning"
"Your call is very important to us"