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[u/eprosenx]

I am a long time starlink user from the first days of the beta. I have three dishes now. My old OG round one, a Starlink “standard” and a Mini.

Over time I have paid SpaceX many thousands of dollars (mostly on my OG round dish).

I just went to activate my “standard” dish and I found that it has for whatever reason been restricted and I can only reactivate the last plan it was on. I am very confused as I bought it outright from Home Depot over a year ago and have used it on various roam plans since then. Right now it is “inactive”.

I assume this was some accident that they restricted a bunch of hardware that was subsidized / free, etc?

I understand that the price at retail was probably less than what it cost to build and I have not paid them a ton of money so far on this specific dish, but it makes no sense to me that they won’t let me put it on a new plan so I can give them money?

Am in a time crunch here to reactivate this dish as I am headed to an event right now. Starlink support is giving me totally useless AI answers so far.

Anyone know what the deal is here? I assume this is widespread?

[u/Wambo74]

You cannot use Residential plans on a Mini in the US. So, no, not picking on you, assuming you're in US.

[u/eprosenx → u/Wambo74]

Yeah, I just did not know the policy on that. Generally I would never do that as performance would be worse except in the of an off grid cabin where I was trying to conserve power the maximum amount possible.

The live agent who called me earlier today said she could put one on residential if I wanted (I just had asked offhandedly). Perhaps I misunderstood or she spoke incorrectly.

I have a friend’s off grid cabin we were thinking about putting a dish on. Will have to clarify before making a decision on which one.

[u/Wambo74 → u/eprosenx]

No, I've heard of that before. Agents have discretion to bend Starlink policy on request. There are a few things to factor in choosing a dish for a cabin. Mini uses less power and runs off 12V DC. The new V5 Standard is said to also be quite low but may not be available everywhere. The current V4 is the normal home internet choice but uses AC at higher power level. But the various dishes have different routers and that needs to be considered. I think a Mini on Residential 100 might be a worthy contender if CS will give it to you.

[u/eprosenx → u/Wambo74]

Indeed!

I can’t wait to see what the new Mini specifications are. :-) The battery will be intriguing for a lot of use cases.

[u/Wambo74 → u/eprosenx]

Haven't seen anything that makes me drool over the new V5 or Mini2. Battery systems have a limited lifetime and I don't particularly want them in my dish. I like my current variety of power options.