New Satellite Claims 100 Gbps Transfer Capacity

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New Satellite Claims 100 Gbps Transfer Capacity ViaSat signed an agreement with Arianespace to launch the ViaSat-1 satellite.

Last Thursday's announcement said the satellite is scheduled for launch by an Ariane 5 during the first half of 2011 from Kourou, French Guiana.

ViaSat-1 is being built by Space Systems/Loral in Palo Alto, Calif.. The ViaSat networks Web site says the satellite will support 2 million subscribers with service "on a par with DSL and cable." The satellite will have 10 times the throughput of any other Ka-band satellite.

A chart on the Web site show the baseline designed capacity of the satellite is 100 Gbps. Basic service speed will be 2 Mbps. Other reports indicate the satellite will be located at 115 degrees West Longitude and provide service to hard-to-reach areas in the United States and Canada.

If portable uplinks are allowed to access the satellite, it could revolutionize remote newsgathering operations by providing a high-speed Internet connectivity capable of supporting compressed video data rates anywhere in the continental United States.

Read more of Doug Lung's RF Reporthere.

Doug Lung
Doug Lung
Contributor

Doug Lung is one of America's foremost authorities on broadcast RF technology. As vice president of Broadcast Technology for NBCUniversal Local, H. Douglas Lung leads NBC and Telemundo-owned stations’ RF and transmission affairs, including microwave, radars, satellite uplinks, and FCC technical filings. Beginning his career in 1976 at KSCI in Los Angeles, Lung has nearly 50 years of experience in broadcast television engineering. Beginning in 1985, he led the engineering department for what was to become the Telemundo network and station group, assisting in the design, construction and installation of the company’s broadcast and cable facilities. Other projects include work on the launch of Hawaii’s first UHF TV station, the rollout and testing of the ATSC mobile-handheld standard, and software development related to the incentive auction TV spectrum repack. A longtime columnist for TV Technology, Doug is also a regular contributor to IEEE Broadcast Technology. He is the recipient of the 2023 NAB Television Engineering Award. He also received a Tech Leadership Award from TV Tech publisher Future plc in 2021 and is a member of the IEEE Broadcast Technology Society and the Society of Broadcast Engineers.