Fibre or Starlink:
which one suits me?

No, and that isn't the right question. Fibre is more stable, has lower latency and doesn't depend on the sky or the weather: it is simply better technology where it exists. Starlink solves a different problem, which is providing decent internet where there is neither fibre nor a reasonable terrestrial alternative. There it isn't competing with fibre; it's competing with having no connection, or with relying on a mobile phone as a router. The confusion comes from comparing the two as if they were interchangeable at any address, when in reality availability decides ninety per cent of the case before you look at any other variable. If fibre is available to you and you keep ruling it out in favour of Starlink, it's worth asking why: usually it's because nobody has properly checked the real coverage, or because the decision was made with data from a different address on the same street. Check first, decide afterwards.

Fibre coverage isn't a fixed figure, nor something you can look up on a generic map and take as gospel: it depends on whether the operator has run cable to your particular building, and that changes street by street and even number by number. On industrial estates and in scattered residential developments it's common for one building to have fibre and the one next door not to, simply because the rollout got that far and stopped. The only reliable check is to look up coverage for the exact address, with several operators if necessary, because they haven't all reached the same point. Asking by postcode won't do, and neither will assuming you're covered because a neighbour is: your own number has to be verified. We carry out that check free of charge before recommending anything, precisely because we install both technologies and gain nothing by overstating the coverage of one over the other.

Yes, for normal office use: video calls, email, cloud applications and browsing work well most of the time. What changes compared with fibre is consistency: Starlink's latency varies more because it depends on which satellite is serving your dish at any given moment and on how busy the cell is, so in a long meeting you may get the odd micro-dropout or a momentary frozen picture that wouldn't happen on fibre. Most video-calling tools absorb this without it being too noticeable. Where it does show is in applications that demand a constant connection with no margin, such as heavy use of VoIP telephony, remote desktop all day long or remote control of machinery: there, a half-second dropout really does matter. If your work is of this second kind and fibre is available, fibre avoids a problem that exists with Starlink, however infrequent.

Yes, without exception: the dish needs to see a wide portion of sky in the direction of the satellites assigned to it, and any obstacle in that cone cuts the signal for as long as the obstruction lasts. What determines whether a spot will work isn't the height of the roof in the abstract, but what surrounds it right now and what will be there in a few years' time: a young tree that isn't in the way today may block the view once it grows, and a building put up on the plot next door may cut off an angle that is clear today. That's why the mounting point is decided with a real check on site, not worked out from a plan. The symptoms of a poor location don't look like an installation problem: they look like random dropouts that come and go, and that leads many people to think the service is failing when what is actually failing is where the dish has been put.

Yes, and in businesses where a fibre fault means grinding to a halt it's one of the most sensible combinations there is. It's set up with a dual-WAN router that detects when the main line goes down and switches to Starlink automatically, without anyone having to step in. The advantage over building the backup with a 5G SIM lies in genuine independence: a fault in the local fibre network, or an outage that also affects nearby mobile masts, can leave you without both if they share terrestrial infrastructure. Starlink doesn't rely on that same network, so the failure would have to be far wider to take both down at once. The cost of this redundancy should be weighed against what each hour offline costs you: in an office with a handful of staff it may not be worth it; in a business that takes its revenue online it almost always is.

Yes, the dish itself can be taken down and relocated without any technical difficulty. What doesn't move so easily is the check that made it work where it was: the new spot needs its own clear cone of sky, and you can't take that for granted just because the previous location worked well. The cable route to the router also changes, and it may be longer or pass through different parts of the house or warehouse, which affects how the mount is fixed and where the line is protected. If you know in advance that you'll be moving it, for example because of planned building work or a change in how the building is used, mention it when planning the initial installation: sometimes it's worth running an empty conduit or choosing a mount that makes the move easier, and that's far cheaper decided beforehand than improvised afterwards.

There can be occasional degradation, yes, but not in just any rain: what really has an effect is heavy precipitation, not the ordinary rain of the Vallès, which barely shows in the service. What is a genuine problem is snow settling directly on the dish, because it physically blocks the signal in a way that rain doesn't; that's why the dishes include a heater that melts it as long as there's power. A severe storm with a lot of water in the air may be noticeable for the few minutes it lasts, with some drop in speed or a brief dropout, just as happens with any radio link. Outside those occasional episodes, everyday performance doesn't depend on the weather. If your location has winters with frequent snowfall, it's worth making sure the dish has a stable power supply, because without it the heater can't do its job.

Then the sensible thing is to switch, and it's a common scenario: there are parts of the Vallès where the fibre rollout is advancing street by street while someone has already had Starlink running for some time. That's why, if fibre has been announced for your address but not yet rolled out, it's important to look at the terms of the Starlink contract before signing, specifically how long a minimum term you're taking on and what it will cost you to cancel if fibre arrives sooner than expected. There's no point tying yourself into a long commitment when the solution you're buying is, by definition, a bridge to something else. When the time comes to switch, the fibre installation is usually quick because you already have an internal network in place; all that changes is the line coming into the house or warehouse. That's a good moment to check whether the indoor distribution is still adequate for the new bandwidth.