How is WiFi quality on Celebrity (Eclipse)? Did X transition to Starlink?

[Tatka]

We usually sail with Royal, but love X.

Recently they switched from Surf & Stream to just a Stream and use Starlink.

 

 Did X transition to Starlink? How is WiFi quality on Celebrity (Eclipse)?

 

We are thinking about booking 11 dayer on Eclipse to New England and Canada from Boston in Aug 28 2024 and maybe I will need to work on 1 or 2 days from the ship. This of course will depend on quality of internet. I worked once from Silhouette, but that was long time ago.

[Charles4515]

5 minutes ago, Tatka said:

We usually sail with Royal, but love X.

Recently they switched from Surf & Stream to just a Stream and use Starlink.

 

 Did X transition to Starlink? How is WiFi quality on Celebrity (Eclipse)?

 

We are thinking about booking 11 dayer on Eclipse to New England and Canada from Boston in Aug 28 2024 and maybe I will need to work on 1 or 2 days from the ship. This of course will depend on quality of internet. I worked once from Silhouette, but that was long time ago.

Celebrity is transitioning to Starlink just like Royal has been. Both lines will be finished installing by 2024. 

 

 

[lovecruzin]

Eclipse has transitioned to Starlink. Our S Pacific and NZ cruises wifi in the cabin was not good. We joked that perhaps Elon doesn’t like that part of the world. Wifi was better near the elevators and in the ilounge however we did have 1-2 days with no signal at all.

[Mark_T]

We had the basic wifi on Eclipse in January this year, couldn’t even get this forum to load …

 

 

[Charles4515]

20 minutes ago, lovecruzin said:

Eclipse has transitioned to Starlink. Our S Pacific and NZ cruises wifi in the cabin was not good. We joked that perhaps Elon doesn’t like that part of the world. Wifi was better near the elevators and in the ilounge however we did have 1-2 days with no signal at all.

Starlink does not have full world coverage yet. In areas without coverage Celebrity has to fall back to the older satelites. Starlink is still launching and has launched over 3000 satelites of a planned 12,000 in initial buildout. Hopefully Starlink coverage will improve if Elon does not waste too many  billions on Twitter. 

Edited February 3, 2023 by Charles4515

[lovecruzin]

12 minutes ago, Charles4515 said:

Starlink does not have full world coverage yet. In areas without coverage Celebrity has to fall back to the older satelites. Starlink is still launching and has launched over 3000 satelites of a planned 12,000 in initial buildout. Hopefully Starlink coverage will improve if Elon does not waste too many  billions on Twitter. 

I would have been quite angry if I paid for wifi on our cruises. But I was on Holiday and it was just an annoyance. 

[NutsAboutGolf]

25 minutes ago, Mark_T said:

We had the basic wifi on Eclipse in January this year, couldn’t even get this forum to load …

 

 

 

Which has always been the case with or without starlink, always needed the premium to access this site or use native wifi calling (you could make wifi calls using 3rd party apps like whatsapp)

[Mark_T]

2 minutes ago, NutsAboutGolf said:

 

Which has always been the case with or without starlink, always needed the premium to access this site or use native wifi calling (you could make wifi calls using 3rd party apps like whatsapp)

Exactly, nothing has changed, but some were expecting Starlink to improve basic as well, but that isn’t the case. 

[NutsAboutGolf]

1 hour ago, Charles4515 said:

Celebrity is transitioning to Starlink just like Royal has been. Both lines will be finished installing by 2024. 

 

 

 

X so far has released two starlink deployment schedules to the public yet seems to deviate/deploy it ahead of schedule.  If the most recent schedule is accurate, it would appear its deployed on all ships except the Connie (scheduled to get it this month on the 24th) and the Infinity (Jan 2024!!!)

[NutsAboutGolf]

3 minutes ago, Mark_T said:

Exactly, nothing has changed, but some were expecting Starlink to improve basic as well, but that isn’t the case. 

 

Haven't had basic with starlink so I'm not sure.  Only had Starlink on the Solstice and just so happened to be on her about two months earlier without Starlink.  Premium was an average of .9mbps; should be noted the wifi starts to become unusable if lower than .7mbps.  With starlink the average was 2.5mbps which is good for a cruise ship but nothing to write home about.  Was on CCL's newest ship the Celebration where I was getting faster numbers than my home internet.  It seems X greatly throttles the speeds down

[Tatka]

1 hour ago, NutsAboutGolf said:

 

Which has always been the case with or without starlink, always needed the premium to access this site or use native wifi calling (you could make wifi calls using 3rd party apps like whatsapp)

 

 It is interesting that X is still offering both.

On RCI there is only 1 option now.

[Charles4515]

43 minutes ago, Tatka said:

 

 It is interesting that X is still offering both.

On RCI there is only 1 option now.

X has always charged about 3 times as much for the same WiFi as RCI. My theory is that since it has been an  all Included option they want to claim they are giving passengers a $240 value not $100. I would crise on Royal and pay $85 after discount and then $240 minus Elite Plus discount on Celebrity because I did not book any of the all included options. 

Edited February 3, 2023 by Charles4515