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Who here has sat? Opinions needed

F

flxnimprtmscl

Diamond Member
I've finally gotten sick enough of 56k that I'm going to be looking into sat in the next few days. I just wanted opinions from you guys over whether it's worth it, average downtime, etc.

Also are there any good providers out there besides starband (which I'm pretty sure is in the middle of chapter 11) and directway? If not which is the better of the two overall in terms of service, price, etc.

Any input you guys have for me would be much appreciated. Plus any good forums out there for sat owners where I can research this a bit more would be helpful. Thanks.
 
alt.satellite.direcpc 😀

If you are looking to game, satellite is the wrong thing. If you are looking to download large amounts of data, anything made by Hughes Electronics is a bad thing (look for information on Fair Access Policy (also known as a word that is apparently banned here :|).
 
wow, I just took a look at F.A.P.
225Mb? you could not get an OS image, knoppix, for example. I'd call this crap "shallow band". Broad, but not to deep!!
 
I've messed around with sat it franky I wasn't impressed at all. The delays are huge. Try it and see how it works. Are you sure there isn't any wireless ISP's around your area?
 
I checked into wireless a few months ago and was able to find one company in my area. Area meaning within 15 miles or so. They told me that to be able to get it you pretty much had to have line of site on one of their antennas. Unfortunately out here in the sticks about the only thing I have line of site on is tree's. Unless someone clears all the tree's out of this area and knocks out a hill or two I'll never be able to get wireless unfortunately.
 
There are only 2 providers in the US that provide SAT internet service to consumers.... DirecWay/DirecPC and Starband/Gilat.

Personally I got Starband during the second year of its operation and had it for about a year and a half, at which time a local ISP began offering 3Mbit up/down fixed wireless 😀

I had good download rates, about 300KB/sec, with bursts to 1MB on occasions. Uploads around 10KB/sec. Playing any type of online game was out of the question as your latency is 800ms MINIMUM. It averaged around 1200ms. The only downtimes I had where during Starband's failed attempt to upgrade many Model 180 modems, this was solved in about a day. And anytime there was a big enough thunderstorm to block the signal.

About 2 years ago at my work (chain of 4 home center/hardware type stores, affiliated with Do-It-Best) I switched our inter-store network over to a satellite internet service called "SpaceNet" that DiB offers all members. I was quite suprised to find out that its just Starband/Gilat's service re-branded 😀 We are going on our 3rd year using it, glad I made the move to it 😀

Be warned that DirectWay, since they where DirecPC. Have what they call Fair Access Policy. Basically if you download more than 100MB in an hour they will knock your download rates to sub-56k speeds for several hours. Starband has never had such a policy, and still doesn't 😀
 
I just wanted to add, (since I work for a Wireless ISP) that when they say Line of sight, its not visual line of site its "radio" line of site, so just because off in the distance all you can see is trees doenst mean anything, thats all I can see as well and I have Wireless at my home. Alot of factors influence you getting a signal, (how high is there antanae etc.) Might be worth checking into, you WILL NOT be happy with Sat.
 
Originally posted by: pmailloux
I just wanted to add, (since I work for a Wireless ISP) that when they say Line of sight, its not visual line of site its "radio" line of site, so just because off in the distance all you can see is trees doenst mean anything, thats all I can see as well and I have Wireless at my home. Alot of factors influence you getting a signal, (how high is there antanae etc.) Might be worth checking into, you WILL NOT be happy with Sat.
Click to expand...

So what exactly qualifies as "radio" line of sight? Here's my situation. I'm roughly 12-14 miles as the crow files from any of the nearest wisp's antennas, plenty of trees between here and there, and they're at a slightly higher elevation, call it 100 feet or so. Does this sound like there's any hope and if so how do I get them out here to check it out? Thanks 🙂
 
Originally posted by: pmailloux
I just wanted to add, (since I work for a Wireless ISP) that when they say Line of sight, its not visual line of site its "radio" line of site, so just because off in the distance all you can see is trees doenst mean anything, thats all I can see as well and I have Wireless at my home. Alot of factors influence you getting a signal, (how high is there antanae etc.) Might be worth checking into, you WILL NOT be happy with Sat.
Click to expand...

i once worked for a wireless isp and i remember spending alot of my time cutting tree branches so the customer could get "line of sight". "radio" line of sight can also be read as "yeah our service will work at your house ... buy the equipment and see for yourself .... but no refunds if you DON'T get a signal." wireless isp works like sat ... weather, trees, and birds WILL affect your signal

dude .... if you are going sat .... you better do for the long haul ... the equipment cost are pretty high .... $300 to $600 range the last time i looked.

also ... if you are looking into wireless isp and the company is a good one and wants your business ... they will come out and test to see if you can get a signal

good luck
 
Well, if I go direcway the equipment and install are 80 bucks or so and service is $100 a month for the first year after which it drops down to $60. Starband is alot more expensive with equipment and instal running you about a grand and then still paying about $60 a month. But yes, looks like with the bad wireless news I've recived I'm in it for the long haul. I'm about 7 miles from the nearest CO and it doesn't even support dsl anyway. Cable will never ever ever be available out here so it looks like sat's what I'm stuck with since I'm not selling my house so I can get a better connection. On a side note I hate the qwest, trees, hills, and high earth orbit sattelites 🙁
 
I have direcway and overall I'm satisfied. Make a list of what your expectations are though. As others have said, sat is NOT for gaming, hosting,
etc... I have hit download speeds between 256K and 4.5M. I have averaged 86K upload speed. Sat service is affected by the weather, the number of users
(just like cable) and such. Also, about the Access Policy, yes its there, but be realistic, how many people download 100Mb/hour every hour of the day???
The truthful answer is probably only 1 or 2. I have my service shared through my home network with no problems. The only problem I did have was
stability of the software on my XP Pro system. I wiped this out and put on 2k and have not had a problem since. I live in an area where I have 1/4 mile
from the switching office but it is so rural that I will probably never see DSL. Cable is totally out of the question. Wireless is in the area but not
close enough to my residence. The estimated time-frame for wireless in my area was 5 years. In doing my research, everyone warned me to stay away from
Starband. Reasons given ranged from the company is having money troubles to the service just plain wasn't worth the money. Best of Luck!!!
 
I have StarBand running here and it's great. 1.2 Mbps downloads most of the time. No "Fair Access Policy" like DWay so your speeds never drop to 56k when downloading big files. The reliability has really improved since the dark ages of StarBand. I've truly never seen it go down except for in severe t-storms - then it still fades in and out. If you decide to go StarBand, make sure you get a good installer to install it.
 
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