Royal Princess - Internet Speed?

[ccndfw]

We are on the Royal Princess in a few weeks and I'm trying to decide if I want to purchase an Internet package. Has anyone experienced this recently? Is the connection super slow? Does it drop? We were on the Caribbean Princess in November and it wasn't the best experience, but at least let me check email...

[Thrak]

The best description of Internet service on all Princess ships would include the words S...L...O...W and POOP.

 

Princess will say it's because they are at the mercy of the satellite provider speed but there are definitely much faster satellite Internet connections than one gets on Princess ships.

[jasbo49]

We were on the ship Jan. 19-29 and had pretty decent speed compared to other cruises. This may have been partly due to our cabin (M102) being right above the bridge.

 

I assume the quality varies based on location, and I'd guess the needs of the bridge may have benefited us too.

 

Jim

[azbirdmom]

We were on the ship Jan. 19-29 and had pretty decent speed compared to other cruises. This may have been partly due to our cabin (M102) being right above the bridge.

 

I assume the quality varies based on location, and I'd guess the needs of the bridge may have benefited us too.

 

Jim

 

We were in C319 on your cruise and probably had the best in-cabin wifi reception of any Princess ship we had been on. I propped the door open the first time I connected to wifi from our cabin and got 5 bars surprisingly. The next day I didn't prop the door open and it stayed between 4 and 5 bars. It was a noticeable difference. Still not like land-based wifi but if the speed would be like this on other Princess ships, I would be very happy.

[rzmz89]

Just got off the Royal and the internet is slow.

[Todd320]

Off the Royal today and we were also on it in December, Internet service is slow but is much better than it was last season.

[pilot]

Off the Royal today. Internet speed was not terrible. Didn't come close to using our 500 minutes.

 

 

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[satxdiver]

You are on a moving ship in the ocean that is using satellite to offer internet access and sharing it with 3000 or so other pax. I have found that the best speed was obtained late at night (midnight to about 5:00 AM) or during the early dinner hours when many are in the MDR. It also is dependent on the strength of the signal (2 bars vs 5 bars) where the smaller signal requires a larger number of retransmissions (computer talk here). Expect S L O W and sometimes losing the connection only to have to re-establish it losing whatever you were doing. Think about the old dial up days for a comparison.

[caribill]

You are on a moving ship in the ocean that is using satellite to offer internet access and sharing it with 3000 or so other pax. I have found that the best speed was obtained late at night (midnight to about 5:00 AM) or during the early dinner hours when many are in the MDR. It also is dependent on the strength of the signal (2 bars vs 5 bars) where the smaller signal requires a larger number of retransmissions (computer talk here). Expect S L O W and sometimes losing the connection only to have to re-establish it losing whatever you were doing. Think about the old dial up days for a comparison.

 

Opening the door a little in your cabin to the hallway can result in a week signal becoming a strong one. When I need to do this, I just put a cabin trash can to block the door from fully closing.

[Colo Cruiser]

We are on the Royal Princess in a few weeks and I'm trying to decide if I want to purchase an Internet package. Has anyone experienced this recently? Is the connection super slow? Does it drop? We were on the Caribbean Princess in November and it wasn't the best experience, but at least let me check email...

 

 

No way to tell ahead of time.

Every cruise is different.

Yes its slow and yes it drops and it also locks up.

I look at usually 2 speeds being available onboard, slow and non existent.

[easyboy]

Last time I was on the Royal was Nov 2015. Not sure if it's any different now.

That time, checking my email and web browsing was far slower from my internet speed at home. Loading takes time and sometimes gets disconnected, but not frequently. Had similar experience in our next sailings on other ships.

[jennybenny]

I never have high expectations of internet speed as most cruises have given me problems. Something that should take 5 minutes takes 25....

I did get good speeds one night in my cabin at 1 am but I'm not staying up late to get on the internet

 

It's been very disappointing to deal with such slow speeds during the day

 

 

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[reallyme]

We were in C319 on your cruise and probably had the best in-cabin wifi reception of any Princess ship we had been on. I propped the door open the first time I connected to wifi from our cabin and got 5 bars surprisingly. The next day I didn't prop the door open and it stayed between 4 and 5 bars. It was a noticeable difference. Still not like land-based wifi but if the speed would be like this on other Princess ships, I would be very happy.

 

The bars indicate signal strength, not speed. What was the speed?

[geoherb]

The bars indicate signal strength, not speed. What was the speed?

Slow. I never did a speed test this month on the Royal. But my hometown paper took around 3 to 4 minutes to download. It's around 15 second at home. Sometimes it would be taking a lot longer, and I'd abort the download. I managed to make do with my free minutes and not buying extra by doing most things quickly while online then reading them offline.

[bobby3334]

In general It had been fairly normal but no where as fast as new high speed. I tend to use it at times it is not being used by everyone else, late at night or mid afternoon or on port day I use for free in terminal or buy an a coffee at a nearby cafe. The entire NYT downloads in about a minute or two if done at those times or places. Mike

 

 

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[Griller]

Does anyone know when the Medallion upgrade is going to be done for Royal like it is on Regal?

 

I know they temporarily abandoned it on Regal when it went to Europe and meanwhile fixed Caribbean P up with it, but maybe once they finish Regal they might start on Royal?

 

I don't think I like the actual Medallion but I love the free 24/7 one device internet for platinum/elite, long may it continue.

[Haboob]

The best description of Internet service on all Princess ships would include the words S...L...O...W and POOP.

 

Princess will say it's because they are at the mercy of the satellite provider speed but there are definitely much faster satellite Internet connections than one gets on Princess ships.

 

Oh? Please name one.

 

Don't bother trying "the ones RCCL uses for Voom℠ " because those are the ones

Princess ships use for MedallionNet and PrincessCONNECT when in range.

https://www.cruisecritic.com/news/news.cfm?ID=8430

In fact, back in Feb, Regal quadrupled the previous internet-at-sea speed record.

https://www.ship-technology.com/features/race-faster-wifi-board-cruise-ships/

 

But, yes, Princess (and HAL, RCCL, whoever) crawl by comparison when they get

out of range of the SES satellites.

[love2cruisegirl1]

Was just on the Royal. South Hampton to NYC. The internet was surprisingly fast. Our cabin was right under the Bridge so don't know if that made a difference,but not bad at all.

[bobby3334]

Was just on the Royal. South Hampton to NYC. The internet was surprisingly fast. Our cabin was right under the Bridge so don't know if that made a difference,but not bad at all.

 

 

 

I concur and my cabin was midship. Mike

 

 

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[pablo222]

We were in C319 on your cruise and probably had the best in-cabin wifi reception of any Princess ship we had been on. I propped the door open the first time I connected to wifi from our cabin and got 5 bars surprisingly. The next day I didn't prop the door open and it stayed between 4 and 5 bars. It was a noticeable difference. Still not like land-based wifi but if the speed would be like this on other Princess ships, I would be very happy.

 

As part of the medallion roll-out, princess is installing access points in each cabin.

 

(this was for regal)

 

"During the upgrades, work teams will run roughly 75 miles of cable, install almost 7,000 sensors, 650 experience-edge computing devices and 1,780 in-cabin Wi-Fi access points on each ship."

 

http://phx.corporate-ir.net/phoenix.zhtml?c=140690&p=irol-newsArticle&ID=2256078

 

 

I know there were previously no in cabin access points previously, with a wifi signal

strength app on my phone. Nothing in the cabins, and found several in the hallways that

were not working.

[GarettsNana]

Currently on Royal and speed tests (when I can actually connect with a server) averages .36 Mbps.  

 

They advertise the 500 Mb package "From e-mail to streaming, enjoy truly premium access!" What a joke. It's impossible to view a 10-second video on Facebook, much less stream a movie.

[Colo Cruiser]

8 minutes ago, GarettsNana said:

Currently on Royal and speed tests (when I can actually connect with a server) averages .36 Mbps.  

 

They advertise the 500 Mb package "From e-mail to streaming, enjoy truly premium access!" What a joke. It's impossible to view a 10-second video on Facebook, much less stream a movie.

Yeah but you are on a cruise......

[Haboob]

8 hours ago, GarettsNana said:

Currently on Royal and speed tests (when I can actually connect with a server) averages .36 Mbps.  

 

They advertise the 500 Mb package "From e-mail to streaming, enjoy truly premium access!" What a joke. It's impossible to view a 10-second video on Facebook, much less stream a movie.

 

Reality check...

There is a constellation of equatorial MEO satellites that provides much (10x) wider uplinks than the GEO

satellites that traditionally supplied uplinks to ships.  Below 48ºN Royal uses the MEO satellites and you get

actual full-up HD video streaming and 350ms ping times.  Above 48ºN she can only see the GEO satellites

in their higher orbits so you get broken promises of full-up HD video streaming and 750ms ping times.

[BeachBum777]

ping was not a factor for me at 665 - I was able to stream non stop at 4 meg down zero buffering,  So not sure that's a major issue with the new tech on all of the ships. This was on NCL. Cant wait to test diamond princess next moth is Asia.

[Potstech]

Got off the Royal on Dec 15. Had no problem with the wifi connection.  Only used it to check emails and a few websites.  All connected with no problem using an ipad anywhere on the ship.