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Starlink To Launch In Lebanon As Soon As 2022

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starlink to launch in lebanon as soon as 2022
Starlink

After launching its beta service to select customers across the United States and Canada, Elon Musk’s satellite internet constellation, Starlink, is set to launch in Lebanon as soon as 2022.

Last year, Lebanese computer science researcher Nadim Kobeissi asked Elon Musk on Twitter to position one of his satellites over Lebanon. His tweet quickly gained traction among other Lebanese Twitter users, many of which have to rely on slow and unreliable internet connections that are behind the rest of the world.

To everyone’s surprise, Musk replied, assuring Nadim that Starlink would provide global coverage. Well, it’s now clear that Musk was serious because pre-orders are already available with a fully refundable deposit of $99. The deposit will go toward the cost of the hardware kit ($499), the monthly service fee ($99 a month), and the shipping & handling fee (varies from region to region).

The fine print states that paying the deposit doesn’t guarantee availability. Instead, the deposit gives the payer’s order a higher priority in their region for ordering Starlink when it becomes available in the future.

Those who receive the Starlink kit can look forward to data speeds between 50 Mbps and 150 Mbps and latency from 20 ms to 40 ms, which is good enough for online gaming, high-definition streaming, and video conferencing. Both speed and latency are promised to keep improving as SpaceX, the company behind Starlink, launches more satellites and improves its software.

Already, around 1,000 Starlink satellites have been launched into orbit, but SpaceX has sought approval for tens of thousands more. Other private companies that are planning to launch satellite internet constellations include OneWeb, Amazon, Samsung, and Boeing.

Also Read: Instagram Music Is Finally Available In The Middle East

At the moment, satellite internet access is aimed mostly at people living in rural and hard-to-reach locations, where wired connectivity has typically been a challenge. As the technology improves and the number of satellites in orbit increases, it’s possible that it will become a viable alternative to broadband internet even in otherwise well-connected areas.

It still isn’t clear whether or not the Lebanese government will formally allow the use of Starlink within the country as Ogero, Lebanon’s state telecommunications operator, doesn’t allow the use of Internet services that don’t pass through their network. It will be interesting to see what their take is on the matter.

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Samsung’s Galaxy Watch 9 And Ultra 2 Specs Leak Ahead Of Unpacked

An 800mAh Ultra 2 battery and a switch from Exynos to Qualcomm silicon headline the expected changes for Samsung’s next smartwatches.

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samsung's galaxy watch 9 and ultra 2 specs leak ahead of unpacked

Samsung’s next smartwatches have little left to hide. A new leak reported by Android Authority has surfaced most of the remaining details about the Galaxy Watch 9 and Galaxy Watch Ultra 2, just over a week before the company’s Galaxy Unpacked event on July 22.

The biggest change is an invisible one: Samsung is expected to drop its own Exynos W1000 chip in favor of Qualcomm’s Snapdragon Wear Elite SW6100, a chipset unveiled only this year, according to the outlet.

Battery capacity looks like the other notable upgrade. Citing a report from Winfuture, Android Authority says the Watch Ultra 2 could reach 800mAh, well beyond the 590mAh cell in the current Watch Ultra. The 44mm Watch 9 reportedly gets a 445mAh cell — the same capacity as last year’s Watch 8 Classic — while the 40mm model stays at 325mAh.

The 40mm Watch 9 will reportedly feature a 438 x 438-pixel panel, with the 44mm Watch 9 and the Watch Ultra 2 sharing a larger 480 x 480-pixel screen. Samsung leaker Ice Universe has separately claimed the Ultra 2’s display could reach a peak brightness of 5,000 nits. RAM and storage vary by model, topping out at 2GB and 64GB.

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The Ultra 2 keeps its titanium case and 100-meter water resistance; the standard Watch 9 remains aluminum, rated to 5 ATM. All models are said to include Bluetooth 6.0, NFC, and dual-band WiFi, with the usual LTE variants, and ship with One UI 9 Watch running on Wear OS 7.

A separate leak puts the Galaxy Watch 9 at €409 (about $468) for the 40mm Bluetooth model, rising to €489 (about $560) for the 44mm LTE version, with the Watch Ultra 2 LTE at €749 (about $857) — figures Android Authority said were partially corroborated by Winfuture. Confirmation arrives on stage on July 22.

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