MrBillM - 2-1-2005 at 05:47 PM
I purchased a VoIP system to use over DirecWay and have found that the equipment would not work properly (outgoing). After some testing, I determined
that the problem was the UPLOAD speed. Although DOWNLOAD speeds were very fast, I am getting upload speeds from 19-34Kbps which is SLOWER than a 56K
dialup modem. My dealer is telling me that this is normal.
Has anyone with DirecWay tested the speed of their system. At www.mydirecway.com, a member can sign on and do the satellite speed test.
I would be interested in hearing the results that others have found.
bajalou - 2-1-2005 at 06:21 PM
I understood DirecWay advertised that upload was similar to dial-up but donwload was faster.
Bob and Susan - 2-1-2005 at 06:44 PM
you never get 56k with dialup....it your computer says it 56k it's lieing
For uploading this is about the speed we had at work when we used the vsat system
Bajabus - 2-1-2005 at 10:52 PM
me and many of my customers use crystal voice over the starband system and it works perfect in both directions except for the 1 sec delay.
Many Starband dealers have known from the start that the Gilat modems Starband uses have multiple channels (about 15 I seem to recall)and that
currently only 4 are used. Right now a Frequency Shifting Time Slot Interleaving access scheme is used to send and receive on the network over the
space segment. A VSAT makes a request and it is put into the next available slot, this at times will add 200 to 500 millisec overhead to the ping
rates. The NOC has the ability to designate a particular VSAT with a higher priority than others so that when it's request is made on a high priority
channel all others are temporarily bumped.
I mention this because the Starband engineering team has set three major goals for this coming year. A faster more robust VPN solution, Web based
commissioning, and dedicated voip channels that will bring latency to a tolerable 450 - 500 millisec. For a slight fee it will be possible to make
fairly decent calls and have the ability to ring or be rung. They say they are 2-4 months away from offering it. In addition they are working on some
codecs that will have the ability to introduce compression schemes after the first 30 - 45 seconds of the call to make the conversation appear
smoother and more natural.
They started doing this when many users noticed that they can kick their 481 or 484 into turbo mode by uploading a large file while they are on a call
and the delay was greatly reduced and very tolerable. Naturally this is a rather big waste of bandwidth to use the turbo upload priority channel to
stay in the stream so they have finally come to their senses and are working on upgrades that allow one of the modem channels to be used exclusively
for VOIP.
They are working closely with Gilat engineers and Spacenet, some of the leaders in VOIP telephony over space segments.
Will it work and will it really be implemented in 2-4 months. We shall see. I would think they will have it up and running before their next top
dealer convention which usually happens sometime over the summer.
There is a big push by both Gilat and Starband to make this work.
Modem Speeds
MrBillM - 2-2-2005 at 10:33 AM
Actually, you never could get 56K out of the
modem because the FCC limits it to 54K, However, back when I was doing Network
Support I have measured actual speeds up to
48K. It's all in the wiring that gets you to the switch. In Hemet, my maintenance facility was next door to the Swiching office. Although the
connection leaving that office was Fiber Optic, the house cable connecting the two buildings was in such poor shape that I never saw higher than 28K
from that
location.