There is statistically a very, very little chance of everyone downloading data at the same time. Communication systems are designed to provide a certain Grade of Service at peak times based on the number of communication channels and users as predicted by Erlang statistical formulas. If some people are data hogs, then the rest of the users are degraded and aren't able to use what they paid for.As I'm always attempting to understand the how's and why's of the satellite internet, I'd like to ask you to elaborate a bit on this recent post you made. Knowing your background in communication technology, I find it fascinating.
Demographics certainly has to enter into it.
Look at a beam map of ES17:
Four beams per (presumed) automated Gateway overseen by two NOC's doing load balancing on the fly.
I too wonder how resources are allocated. I'm on beam 13 with a good share of it centered over Lake Michigan:
Possible choke points are many:
saturation of the satellite transponder itself
Gateway capacity
Gateway server capacity
Many of the answers are going to be proprietary in nature so supposition will have to suffice.
A little scary when considering a gateway itself and the infrastructure serving it may be the major choke pointThat's what I'm wondering. I'm sure they are taking this into consideration, though, and upgrading them if needs be.