• V20: 3CX Re-engineered. Get V20 for increased security, better call management, a new admin console and Windows softphone. Learn More.

High latency remote sites

NAP-LN

Customer
Joined
Sep 20, 2022
Messages
8
Reaction score
0
We have 19 remote sites that currently only have satellite internet leveraging Geostationary satellites. As a result their latency is between 600ms - 1200ms. Sites vary in size from ~6 to 60 people and due to their remote locations onsite infrastructure needs to remain minimal.

We intend to deploy Starlink to these sites, reducing their latency to ~70ms and keeping the existing satellite services as a redundant wan connection. While I understand 600 - 1200 is not viable for VOIP should the Starlink go offline will phone services still work for emergency purposes? Has anyone tested services over geostationary?
 
Depends..

You'd have to test how a phone performs behind an SBC over the current connection.

How are you planning on setting up the 2 internet connections? You'd need load balancing on 1 router if you can. Otherwise, you'd have to leave your 2nd internet connection unplugged, on the same IP as the Starlink gateway and when the internet drops, unplug starlink and plug in the backup.

Either way, you need the SBC talking to the PBX or you will have no phone service.

You could always invest in a cheap mobile phone to be used for emergencies. Though, almost everyone owns a mobile these days so your phone system going down wont stop them unless you're working in a subway.
 
Work? Probably

Work acceptably and reliably enough to be useful? Hmmm... maybe not as you're not even vaguely close to spec for VOIP.

Talkover effect (i.e. audio delays resulting in conversational difficulty) would be horrible with that much latency and the only way to tell how affected you would be by jitter would be to try it. Humans start to detect talkover effect at about 250ms of latency and you're talking about values up to 5 times this and without factoring in any processing delays. Assuming it worked you could end up with something more akin to a conversation between mission control and a space mission.

As kieferschild says, if you want to try this you need routers on each site that can support load balancing / failover.

For a setup like this, I would assume that it is not working until I had successfully tested it by physically pulling the starlink cable and having the second connection kick in. If it's critical this works then I might also think about a regular test schedule.

Whether it's worthwhile probably depends on what you mean by 'emergency'. If you're talking about business continuity and talking to customers it's not likely to be a great solution. If you mean emergency in the true sense (i.e. to alert emergency services or another entity that something has gone horribly wrong) then it might be worthwhile.
 
If the Cellular reception on those sites is acceptable i would sooner look into that area then try the option you stated here.
 
If the Cellular reception on those sites is acceptable i would sooner look into that area then try the option you stated here.

These sites are truly remote in outback Australia, no LTE coverage at all and not connected to any grid services like electricity etc.

We provide satellite phones to these sites as a backup so in the event of a medical emergency having additional options to reach medical services is the goal.
 
Unless it's a major financial saving I would be tempted to stick with your sat phones. Probably more reliable, portable, not dependent on power and designed to deal with the latency / jitter involved.
 
Get 3CX - Absolutely Free!

Link up your team and customers Phone System Live Chat Video Conferencing

Hosted or Self-managed. Up to 10 users free forever. No credit card. Try risk free.

3CX
A 3CX Account with that email already exists. You will be redirected to the Customer Portal to sign in or reset your password if you've forgotten it.