TECH Does anyone use satellite for high-speed internet?

Need some opinions please.

DH and I are out in the boonies and can't get high-speed internet from cable or phone. We're using Net Zero now and it is very slow. We're considering some type of home-based business to bring in some extra money, but will need high-speed internet. The only option to us, as we understand it, is a satellite company.

One is Hughes.net, the other is Wild Blue.

Does anyone have any experience with either of these? Functionality? Speed? Service?

Thanks!

I don't have any idea what the two companies are like but my wife wanted to find out about it and what it would cost! They wanted way to much for the service, like $70 per month so we stay with dial-up for $9. 99. per month.

in a nutshell, satellite does not equal true high speed internet...

you have to shoot a beam from your dish up to a satellite and back down to an earth station, then out onto the backbone...

you have a high latency with satellite internet connections... in layman's terms you have lag... a lot of it... and unless something has changed if you tend to download large files, the provider slows down your speed for a set period of time...

If you can go conventional internet, ie DSL or cable, that's your best bet

I have two friends with Satelite, one Hughes and the other was either Hughes or Wild Blue, neither are/were happy with it. I just got an AT&T card for my computer and it seems to perform okay - just haven't gotten the first bill so I don't know if I will exceed the plan I have or not. If I exceed it, it will be too expensive. The plan is $60 per month, however that makes the second phone line ($37) and the dial up provider ($20) about the same with much better performance.

Can you get cellular service where you are? Alltel and Verizon now offer high speed internet through a cellular modem that blows away satellite for less money. Hughes is not only expensive, it drops out in any kind of bad weather when you need it most, and they have what they call a "Fair Use Policy" that limits the amount you can download to very small levels per day. If you go over your 250-350 meg limit per day they cut you back to dial up speeds for 24 hrs. The 250-350 depends on how much you want to pay. Cellular with Alltel is unlimited download and 2-3 times faster than satellite. Plus it's $15 a month cheaper. I'll never get screwed by Hughes again. Just sayin'.

I don't want to sound bitter but........

By the way, if you are remote enough that signal strength is a problem you can buy external antenna's of varied gain depending on situation. You can also buy a cellular capable router for use with multiple computers. Just some food for thought......

Think 3 times before going with Satellite. Lag time is 4 or 5 seconds (maddening) and there is a thing called fair access policy. Be sure to be conversant with it and it's translation into real life; especially if you are going to run a business.

Check out if you have wireless access or cellular broadband access. Wireless is probably the better deal for large data transfer since the cell broadband has very high overage charges, even with a large plan. Wireless will degrade in heavy rain and or snow, but not as bad as satellite. Good Luck in your search.

I second what Monkeywrench said about going with the cellular internet. That's what I have through Alltel on my Blackberry. It only cost $10 a month extra to get the option to get the internet on my computer by plugging the phone into a standard USB port. When you have full bars, its very fast. I only get about 2 or 3 bars out of the 4 possible in my room, and its still about as fast as cable. Monkeywrench, do you have any links for the external antennas or routers? That's something I've wondered about.

Da Yooper said:

I second what Monkeywrench said about going with the cellular internet. That's what I have through Alltel on my Blackberry. It only cost $10 a month extra to get the option to get the internet on my computer by plugging the phone into a standard USB port. When you have full bars, its very fast. I only get about 2 or 3 bars out of the 4 possible in my room, and its still about as fast as cable. Monkeywrench, do you have any links for the external antennas or routers? That's something I've wondered about.

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I bought the Kyocera KR2 router which is both wireless and hard wire. I have 3 home machines and a wireless laptop all running off of the Alltel modem. The antenna I bought was from Wilson. They have all kinds for different needs and signal amplifiers even if necessary. They have what they call a Trucker antenna that can be mounted as high as you need on a pole, down to a little magnet mount that's only a few inches tall. Even with the cost of the modem which was free after rebate, the router, antenna, cable was still considerably cheaper than what I paid for the satellite system.

In my own defense, they did not have cellular internet when I bought the satellite system. I used the satellite for 5 years and when it quit working they said it would be cheaper for me to buy a complete new system than to have someone out to repair the existing one. Hughes sucks and Wild Blue just sells time on Hughes system from what I understand.

We were held hostage with Wild Blue when we signed up three years ago.

Sadly, at that time they were over subscribing to folks who really did not neet it ie. folks with cell towers near by, or fiber optic linea available, or regular land line phone lines.

Coupled with them losing a satilite and draconion policies such as fair use. And you need optimal southern line of sight exposure. Living in the mountains off grid presented challenges.

They also had pretty poor equipment which kept breaking down after just a few weeks of use.

We actually went four months without service due to faulty equipment. The company kept blaming the hot weather, then the rain and snow. They would not let us out of the two year contract. Many, many customers have filed complaints with the BBB regarding the company not living up to the advertised results.

We were blessed in having a sub contractor who knew his stuff and he helped us out a lot.

We got the service in order to get SKIPE or Vonnage to have phone service because we are one of the last areas of the nation without land line phone lines options. We have never been able to use either service due to the slow connectivity.

For the first 2 1/2 years it the speed was like dial up, only worse.

Then we replaced our piece of dirt Dell lap top with a slightly newer computer and that helped a lot as far as speed.

We spent a lot of time trying to call customer service from the pay phone 12 miles away.

Talk about frustrating when the India operator wants to guide you through a diagnostic test when they can't figure out you are not actually calling from the place where the computer is.

If you are truly interested in going the satilite route, google wildblue sucks or huges sucks, etc.

You can find a lot of useful information on how to navigate the system and get the best deals.

Also be very careful on who the contractor is who comes out. We were lucky to get an honest, respected contractor.

Some folks have had problems with thugs being the installers.

We are pretty satisfied at this point with our service with Wild Blue. Neighbors have Star Band and they really like it.

Our monthly fee is $39.00.

Sis

Jerry said:

Think 3 times before going with Satellite. Lag time is 4 or 5 seconds (maddening) and there is a thing called fair access policy.

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Latency that high is pretty rare. I've had Hughesnet for 3 years now. I installed it myself (Yes, that can be done but thats another story). Most often the latency for me is around 800ms sometimes 1500ms will happen. Satellite internet isn't very good for first person shooter games or for vpn but for most other applications it's great.

The Fap (frequent access policy) is better with Hughes than with Wildblue. With wildblue you can download full speed but if you hit your access allocation then you are throttled for up to 30 days and if you do it habitually they can cancel you.

With Hughes if you hit your Fap your throttled for up to 24 hours and then back to normal. In addition Hughes has a window in the middle of the night where the Fap doesn't apply. Depending on the system it's anywhere between 3 to 5 hours you can download to your hearts content. Just use a download manager and you can schedule your download and don't have to stay up for it. I download old comedy DVD's during the Fap free time in the middle of the night.

For someone coming from dialup your going to love either Hughes or Wildblue. If you are coming from a cable modem your going to hate it. Satellite has it's drawbacks but it's light years ahead of dial up. The base package starts at up to a 1mb download speed. I'm on the Pro Plus plan and during the off peak hours I always get 1.5mb download speeds.

A good forum that discusses Hughes can be found here: http://www.dslreports.com/forum/sat A Wildblue forum can also be found there. I was paying around $70 a month on my telephone bill so I cancelled the phone and went with Hughesnet and it was pretty much a wash. Then I just went with a minimal plan cellphone as I don't talk on the phone much.

If you do have a Wisp or other terrestrial high speed option they you might like that better but for those of us truly in the boonies either system is light years ahead of dial up. Many governmental agencies and emergency operation centers use the Hughes system for emergency communication. When everything else is down as long as the satellite is up in the air and you have some sort of power you'll be on line. I give Hughes my hearty approval.

I am also deep in the boonies in East Texas. I have had wildblue for 2 years now. It is not as fast as as some true high speed connections, but again, I am in the boonies. For me it works very well. If I want to open TBK2000, it isn't an instant operation, but it is very fast and I have no problems with it. I have a AT&T wireless card for business travel, and I can't get a signal at all here at my home. The AT&T card is good in some locations but for me in the boonies it is a BIG failure.

Publius said:

I don't have any idea what the two companies are like but my wife wanted to find out about it and what it would cost! They wanted way to much for the service, like $70 per month so we stay with dial-up for $9. 99. per month.

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I am a little of subject here. I agree totaly about the high expence and it was hard for us to go with high speed Dsl (the off subject part but the point to be made applies.) My wife runs a home bassed business and even though the cost is high for our internet service, she makes that cost back 5 to 10 times over the extra cost every month. She does this with far less frustration and in less time due to the faster speeds. She doesn't have to wait to get her job done like when on dialup.

The original post here says they are thinking of starting a home based business. My wife now makes far more money in less time and with far less frustration. It is a no brainer , if your plan is to run a home based business that will bring in any kind of profits and requires any amount of downloads, surfing, or other regular activinty then you can not afford to not have the best possible service you can obtain. It will pay for itself and make your expirience much more saticfying thus increasing your chances of success. Good luck!
Terry

We also had trouble finding something out here. Phone lines are so old they don't even make parts anymore so could not stay on line. Checked going through the cell phone and we had to sign another 2 year contract which made it 4 years with the phone and it was just dial up speed here. We finally went with Wild Blue. We have had it since Christmas, I got the basic package and it is dial up slow so I might upgrade. So far it has stayed up and no problems but I will keep you posted. All in all it's better than nothing!

We also had trouble finding something out here. Phone lines are so old they don't even make parts anymore so could not stay on line. Checked going through the cell phone and we had to sign another 2 year contract which made it 4 years with the phone and it was just dial up speed here. We finally went with Wild Blue. We have had it since Christmas, I got the basic package and it is dial up slow so I might upgrade. So far it has stayed up and no problems but I will keep you posted. All in all it's better than nothing!

bev said:

Need some opinions please.

DH and I are out in the boonies and can't get high-speed internet from cable or phone. We're using Net Zero now and it is very slow. We're considering some type of home-based business to bring in some extra money, but will need high-speed internet. The only option to us, as we understand it, is a satellite company.

One is Hughes.net, the other is Wild Blue.

Does anyone have any experience with either of these? Functionality? Speed? Service?

Thanks!

Click to expand...

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We are totally out in the boonies in the mountains of Idaho.. We have wild blue and love it.. No problems... Only if snow gets on the dish, wipe it off and your back in business...We had another satellite company previously and had nothing but problems.. We dumped it and got wild blue and love
it...


ELK................
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WELL!!! Wild Blue is not as fast as cable or DSL, BUT if you are out in the boonies like us and all you have is SLOWWWWWWW funky old phone lines then satellite is a blessing.. It so much faster than dial up..But again not as fast as cable or dsl.. We have not had any of the problems mentioned above with wild blue.. Right now for us this is our only option.. No cell towers, and only ancient phone lines...

ELK.......................
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I had Directway (now Hughesnet) about 5 years ago. No where near as fast as DSL or cable but faster than dial up. When I moved I was very happy to get back to cable high speed.


The one thing I will caution is if you live in an area prone to Thunderstorms or Snowstorms. You can and will most likely not have connectivity during these time periods.

Also, at that time my monthly rate was $59.

The key to satellite internet is to get a good installation. If possible contact the local dealer directly and don't go through Hughes or Wildblue corporate offices. If a call go's to corporate the install might be assigned to a company on the other side of the state with an installer that has to drive a long way...good luck getting him back out if something is screwed up. Somebody local (or at least from your general area) is more likely to take the time to do it right and not to take shortcuts.

We've had Hughes satellite for 6 yrs. and one of our good neighbors has had Wildblue for the past 2 yrs. He seems to have much more trouble than we do with connection problems (besides weather).

We use to have far more problems than we do now, but an upgrade about 2 yrs. ago to the Hughes 7000 series modem seemed to fix most of those.

With both companies, if you have tech problems you'll need to have a stiff drink before calling tech. support!!!

Having said that, we wouldn't even consider going back to dial-up!

Skyway USA Satellite Internet and a Question for Monkeywrench

There IS another company that is neither Wild Blue nor Hughes... They had a slightly lower speed option for something in the 30 dollar a month range that might be an option.

http://www.skywayusa.com/

Monkeywrench said:

Can you get cellular service where you are? Alltel and Verizon now offer high speed internet through a cellular modem that blows away satellite for less money. Hughes is not only expensive, it drops out in any kind of bad weather when you need it most, and they have what they call a "Fair Use Policy" that limits the amount you can download to very small levels per day. If you go over your 250-350 meg limit per day they cut you back to dial up speeds for 24 hrs. The 250-350 depends on how much you want to pay. Cellular with Alltel is unlimited download and 2-3 times faster than satellite. Plus it's $15 a month cheaper. I'll never get screwed by Hughes again. Just sayin'.

I don't want to sound bitter but........

By the way, if you are remote enough that signal strength is a problem you can buy external antenna's of varied gain depending on situation. You can also buy a cellular capable router for use with multiple computers. Just some food for thought......

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Monkeywrench, any more links or info on this setup you have for the cheapest possible price? The routers and modems look pretty pricey. I can get a pretty good cellular signal. Also more info on antennae please if possible. Thank you!

I am out in the boonies and am going to be taking online classes next semester that require higher speeds. The Satellite thing turns me off because it's so clunky and expensive.


Elkhollow, ditto on the old phone lines. The lines here are the original lines put in after rural electrification, LOL! In other words the ORIGINAL phone lines!

These Satellite services are tiered. You can pay increasing amounts for higher speed connectivity. For $80/month Wildblue provides about 1.5Mbps downloads. For $40/month you usually get around 256Kbps. And, of course, there is the initial (one time) equipment and install fees. (Often the companies run promotions and heavily discount or waive these.)

Uploads are a different matter altogether. Upload speeds are more or less fast dialup speeds. Raw speed is around 56Kbps. With the compression utility that the company wants to install on your machine, they gimmick the data so that your upload speed looks around 128Kbps. BUT, underlying that it is still only fast modem speeds.

For most users this is not a big deal, but if you like to send (or forward) large emails to people (like uncropped pictures, or PowerPoint slideshows) the email transmission can take a long time, or even be disallowed. (Wildblue, at least, imposes a maximum size limit on email uploads.)

Again, not a big problem for most of us, but this is something that one needs to think about.

DSL, Cable Modem, or wireless (WISP) are by far preferred, but often not available out in the sticks. Similarly cell phone based connectivity is often not available, either from poor coverage, or outdated cell phone systems. (Where I live the new Digital GSM phones will not work as the cell company's hardware is so out of date.)

I hope that the new 802.16 WiMAX networks start to make inroads into rural areas. But I suspect it will be a few years yet.

Satellite is generally better than dial-up, but leaves a lot to be desired.

Wild Blue here, for about the last 6 or 8 months, we were so underserved around here we couldnt even get DSL. Dial up was the only option and it was terribly slow and unreliable, probably due to our location. Yes, its slowe rthan cable and we do have occ fair weather outages when "our beam goes down" whatever the heck that means. Usually they are pretty short. a couple of hours was the most I recall. I think Ive noticed 3 of htem in the whole time we have had the service. It also goes down in really bad weather and occ needs to be repositioned if the winds move the disc off kilter- i think thats been twice and the storms were really, really bad, not just normal ones.

I do like cable better for speed and reliability. We arent paying for the higher speed option,just the basic one. But with only sucky dial up as our other option, I have to say I am very pleased with Wild Blue compared to that. Shortly after we got it Hughes Net also became available. A neigbor a mile down the road got the Hughes net for speed, he games. He said had an awful time with it and has been very unhappy with many more outages, no where near the speed he was told to expect and lousy customer service.

Our service is through the local phone company and our tech support calls go to the same tech support the dial up uses. That may be a factor. They are pretty responsive and easy to work with and speak english and are nearby. We get pretty quick response to any questions or concerns and our few service calls were answered very quickly, like a tech appearing within 24 hrs. MUCH better service than we ever got with cable in SC or WI. I like that.

shakytoad said:

There IS another company that is neither Wild Blue nor Hughes... They had a slightly lower speed option for something in the 30 dollar a month range that might be an option.

http://www.skywayusa.com/

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Skyway is one way satellite internet. The upload request is made through the phone line and then it's downloaded from the satellite to the end user. I had one way interent before the two way. The initial outlay expense is a little less but one way is older technology and most of these companies are simply resellers of the service from someone else and it's a self install for the most part. If you don't want to climb on your roof and install a 3' dish... When your on the net your tying up your phone line and you still need the expense of the dial up account as well although some companies incorporate the dial up account into the service.

We had Skyway first before Wild Blue... We hated it.. Always something going wrong.. We like Wild Blue...


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shakytoad said:

Monkeywrench, any more links or info on this setup you have for the cheapest possible price? The routers and modems look pretty pricey. I can get a pretty good cellular signal. Also more info on antennae please if possible. Thank you!

I am out in the boonies and am going to be taking online classes next semester that require higher speeds. The Satellite thing turns me off because it's so clunky and expensive.


Elkhollow, ditto on the old phone lines. The lines here are the original lines put in after rural electrification, LOL! In other words the ORIGINAL phone lines!

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Here is a link to the antenna's for home directional use which have the highest gains. Once you know the direction of the tower you will be using you just aim it and your done.

http://www.wilsonelectronics.com////Antennas.php?Type=B

If you can get a decent signal already you can buy a smaller cheaper omnidirectional type for automotive application.

Most of the cell companies have rebates on their modems that make them free when you sign a contract with them.

The router is the most expensive part. Then again if you don't need to connect multiple computers you don't need one. Here is a link to one I'm using that's a very reasonable price. About $50 cheaper that I paid just 6 months ago. One thing I would advise though if you purchase one is to update to the latest firmware in the router. Once done you can set it up to do it automatically.

http://www.onsale.com/shop/detail.aspx?dpno=7374658&store=onsale&source=bwbgooglesearch&wt.srch=1&wt.mc_id=bwbgooglesearch&gclid=CIPC7q3U9ZcCFQw9GgodzR0iDA

After this all you need is whatever length RG58 cable and an adapter pigtail to attach it to the modem. Wilson Electronics also sells the pigtails for less that the cellular provider will.

Hope this helps. IMHO this system blows away satellite service with latency times in the 150 ms range. Still not quite fast enough for online gaming but about 4+ times faster than satellite. Alltel's fee is 54.95 mo for unlimited use. I can watch movies on Netflix to my hearts content.

We used Hughesnet for quite a while before DSL became available to us. We liked Hughesnet. Had no problems and got good service here. It is sooooo much faster than dialup. You'll think you died and went to heaven. Of course, if you ever get DSL there you'll like it even better. Hugesnet was expensive but worth it to us.

A neighbor has Hughes; I have Wild Blue. No real complaints for either of us. Living in a desert means less of a problem with heavy clouds blanking out the transmissions.

I had a few minor problems when I first got hooked up, but I was quite pleased with the cooperative help I got.

'Rat

Thanks very much, Monkeywrench!

Just wondering:



Do I have to then pay Blackberry or some other internet service provider monthly in addition to a phone plan or is that all included with the phone service?

Again, many many thanks!

shakytoad said:

Thanks very much, Monkeywrench!

Just wondering:



Do I have to then pay Blackberry or some other internet service provider monthly in addition to a phone plan or is that all included with the phone service?

Again, many many thanks!

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It is additional to your phone plan and has a different number. I don't have any experience with the Blackberry. Da Yooper mentioned an additional service to his for a small fee. Seems to me that would tie up your phone service though. Don't know for sure.

You also mentioned having a good signal strength already. Another cheap thing you can do is just use a USB extension cable to mount the modem in a window. You really want to have at least 3 bars of signal for good fast service.

Thanks everyone! That's a lot of information to digest. I'll have DH read this over and see if he can make sense of it

We have a neighbor friend (10 miles away, on the other side of the mountain) that has a little box-type thing she got from Verizon. It's smaller than a deck of cards, and somehow plugs into her computer (desktop) and gives her high-speed internet and doesn't tie up her home phone line.

I'm not sure (1) what that "thing" is, or (2) if something like that would work for us. We have cell service from US Cellular - NONE of the other providers could give us service inside our house, and only AT&T got us a bar or two outside.

It sure does help to read others' experiences.

bev said:

Thanks everyone! That's a lot of information to digest. I'll have DH read this over and see if he can make sense of it

We have a neighbor friend (10 miles away, on the other side of the mountain) that has a little box-type thing she got from Verizon. It's smaller than a deck of cards, and somehow plugs into her computer (desktop) and gives her high-speed internet and doesn't tie up her home phone line.

I'm not sure (1) what that "thing" is, or (2) if something like that would work for us. We have cell service from US Cellular - NONE of the other providers could give us service inside our house, and only AT&T got us a bar or two outside.

It sure does help to read others' experiences.

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That little box you're describing is a cellular modem. Read my other posts on this thread.

We have Starband satellite internet, and Dish network for TV. We are VERY far out, even most cell phones work poorly out here.

We are VERY happy with both services.
Have had them for about 5 years here, rarely a problem. If you are in snow country, have the dishes installed low so you can brush the snow off. Light snow does not bother the signal until it gets about 8 inches thick, but wet snow interferes even at 1 inch...

For a while my husband had a company laptop and a "phone card modem" for it. It worked out here sometimes, but was NOT noticibly faster than the statellite..

Monkeywrench, I went to an Alltel dealer today and they lent me a usb cell modem to try. It is a name with a "star" in it. I asked her if they had routers and the clerk wasn't knowledgeable if there were routers that would accept a usb cell modem unit.
I am barely getting 1-2 bars and not in every room using a short usb extension cable and having the unit up on something... this would be great if I could just boost the signal and be sure of it.....

Someone gave me a yagi antenna about 7 yrs ago and I have no idea what frequency it is or whatever. The person claimed it could probably pick up a cell phone signal. hmm...

My husband gave me a booster modem that attaches to the phone line and the computer for Christmas. Dial-up has more than doubled in speed. And we don't have to worry about a monthly fee.

We had DirecPC around 8 or 9 years ago. The 2-way service was pretty new then. Before that the dish could only receive, you still needed a land line to send...

Overall it worked pretty well. There was a noticeable delay, but you kinda get used to it after a while. The other problem was service drop out once in a while. If a thunderstorm or big snowstorm got in the way, it would be down for anywhere from a few minutes to several hours...

I'm sure the tech has improved since then, but I'ld still have to consider it "medium speed internet", when compared to cable, or especially fibre today...

shakytoad said:

Monkeywrench, I went to an Alltel dealer today and they lent me a usb cell modem to try. It is a name with a "star" in it. I asked her if they had routers and the clerk wasn't knowledgeable if there were routers that would accept a usb cell modem unit.
I am barely getting 1-2 bars and not in every room using a short usb extension cable and having the unit up on something... this would be great if I could just boost the signal and be sure of it.....

Someone gave me a yagi antenna about 7 yrs ago and I have no idea what frequency it is or whatever. The person claimed it could probably pick up a cell phone signal. hmm...

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You definitely need more than 2 bars for decent speed and reliability. An external antenna is the only way to improve signal strength. Yagi makes cellular antennas and I posted a link to a page with them on it earlier in the thread. You could look at the page and compare them to the antenna you have.

I am using the UTStarcom UM150 modem from Alltel. I believe the ones they have now are UM175s. Everything goes out of date so fast anymore (sigh).

My Alltel dealer didn't know much about the routers either when asked. I had to research that myself. There are a few manufactures for the USB cellular modems. The Kyocera KR2 I bought had the best ratings I could find. If you are only running 1 machine though a router is not needed. Just an antenna.

They also sell signal boosters for external antennas for those way out in the boonies. Antennas need to be made for the 800-900 mhz range for the modems to work properly.

Hope this helps