Front Man Posted November 2, 2006 Share Posted November 2, 2006 (edited) Does anyone on the Forum use or have an oppinion of Huges's Direct PC satellite ISP services? My current line of site provider isn't taking care of business and I have to make a change. Thanks in advance! FM Edited November 2, 2006 by Front Man Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cking Posted November 2, 2006 Share Posted November 2, 2006 Satellite has the inherent delay problem. So far nobody has a router in the sky. So for web browsing you have an initial delay then data comes in OK. However for things like video conferencing or remote drive connections it will seem very slow. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
j2fast Posted November 2, 2006 Share Posted November 2, 2006 I had it at the house about 3 years ago; my basic assessment is that if all you want to do is surf the net (no online gaming, no Internet phone, etc) its just OK if you don't have any other broadband choices (like me). I dropped it because of the cost and because I couldn't use it to work from home. Sat. broadband has an unavoidable latency because the signal has to go from your PC to the sat in orbit to Direct's data-center and then to the web page you request then back again. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Flatland Shooter Posted November 2, 2006 Share Posted November 2, 2006 My daughter has this for work. She lives out in the middle of nowhere. Very reliable, faster that dial-up but nowhere near as fast as a slow DSL line, and very expensive. Once she goes off contract (10 months remaining on a two year contract) she plans on cancelling. Not fast enough to do her work. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lmccrock Posted November 3, 2006 Share Posted November 3, 2006 Using it right now. Actually, Earthlink Satellite which runs over Hughes' network. Combined with Firefox as a browser, it is pretty good for normal web browsing, Firefox is good because it can download several elements on a webpage at once, partially offsetting the latency issue. My satellite downloads are ~100KB/s (1Mb/s). Uploads very slow, maybe 5-10KB/s. VPN to the office does not work, at least my employer has a webmail server so I can do email. If I want to access the software license server for the high zoot CAD software at work, I need to use the dialup (which connects at 14.4kb/s - I am VERY far out in the country). If I had any other option, I would try it. Looking seriously at Cingular's "Laptop" data plan, which is slower on downloads but faster on uploads and the VPN would work. (Cingular is the only carrier here which has any data coverage out here). Lee Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Front Man Posted November 3, 2006 Author Share Posted November 3, 2006 For the same $ I can get slow DSL and a landline phone. I ordered the Huges this afternoon. I still have 6 days to change my mind. Wish I could try both before I made a final decision. FM Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
j2fast Posted November 3, 2006 Share Posted November 3, 2006 For the same $ I can get slow DSL and a landline phone.I ordered the Huges this afternoon. I still have 6 days to change my mind. Wish I could try both before I made a final decision. FM When I had it they had a 30 return policy, you might want to ask them about that. If you get it and don't like it you should be able to reutrn it. You might be out a little effort and I think the cost of the first month's service but that's a lot less that the cost of the equipment/service over the life of the contract. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Front Man Posted November 4, 2006 Author Share Posted November 4, 2006 (edited) I may have to do that i2fast. What I have right now (when it works) is way faster than my nieghbors "High Speed DSL". So the Landline DSL is out of the picture. I don't think the cost of the Hugh's is killer high but I need something as fast as what I have and be rock solid at the same time. Thanks! FM Edited November 4, 2006 by Front Man Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Front Man Posted November 6, 2006 Author Share Posted November 6, 2006 After checking out our local HS DSL I will have the Hugh's installed Thursday. It has to be better than (nothing) what I have now! FM Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
p99shooter Posted November 8, 2006 Share Posted November 8, 2006 For a high latency / high bandwidth connection like satellite, check out enabling RFC 1323 TCP options. If you're using Windows XP, see http://support.microsoft.com/kb/224829 Look for the section on "window scaling" Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Front Man Posted November 8, 2006 Author Share Posted November 8, 2006 For a high latency / high bandwidth connection like satellite, check out enabling RFC 1323 TCP options. If you're using Windows XP, seehttp://support.microsoft.com/kb/224829 Look for the section on "window scaling" Thanks! I printed it off just incase. FM Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Front Man Posted November 10, 2006 Author Share Posted November 10, 2006 I have been home a couple of hours and so far it is rocks! Sauls vids from the (one of my tests) Nationals load really fast in relationship to my previous ISP. I have an email set up issue to but I'll take care of that this morning. Who needs to sleep! The bottom line is it's not cable but It is a big improvemnt over the lack of service I had! FM Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Front Man Posted November 12, 2006 Author Share Posted November 12, 2006 (edited) Tech service = India. They "can't" help me with a second (not default) email address on Outlook. The internet side is AOK. FM Edited November 12, 2006 by Front Man Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Front Man Posted November 27, 2006 Author Share Posted November 27, 2006 (edited) Just to cap this off; I had it uninstalled 9 days into the 30 day trial run. I'll be out of about $180 but I just had to see it for myself. In theory my line of site provider is up and running. Thanks for everyones help! FM Edited November 27, 2006 by Front Man Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
chuckbradley Posted November 28, 2006 Share Posted November 28, 2006 Just curious. how far are you out from the main transmitter with your line of sight servce? I have been using hughes/direcway for 6 years. I cant get anything else out here except wifi which just became available. I talked with them but they couldnt promise me anything, just wanted the sale and a 2 year contract. They actually told me I was better off staying with what I have. Reading your post makes me wonder since you have used both. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Front Man Posted November 28, 2006 Author Share Posted November 28, 2006 You probably are better off staying with Hughes Chuck. One of my issues was they didn't want me using Outlook for my email program. (Outlook is something I can't function without.) It would take me about ten miles to drive to the transmitter so I would say it is five to eight miles line of site. When it works it's fantastic. It doesn't load video as fast as Hughes but a page of real estate listings with still images loads instantly while the Hughes would load the same page a lot slower. I am not hi-tech enough to tell you why. FM Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Front Man Posted November 29, 2006 Author Share Posted November 29, 2006 Bitwind is reinstalled with updates and now SMOKES Hughes. I have reinstalled Mozilla 2.0 too. I must have a spell checker for the Forum but I can't find it right know. Life is finally good again! FM Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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