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astrobaja
Senior Nomad
Posts: 952
Registered: 5-22-2006
Location: near San Pedro Martir Park
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Mood: beam me up
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Alternative to Starband or Hughesnet?
Hi all,
I've been customer to both Starband and Hughesnet and can honestly say both are pretty crappy. Starband might have a slight edge in terms of FAP,
since you can monitor your useage on a rolling average basis.
Since Starband moved to a new bird their service has been pretty slow, about 30-50% slower than normal. I have gotten a notice from them saying they
are working on it but its all over the place right now in terms of speed. We upgraded to the 1500 package which is like 25$ more a month to give us a
5 gig weekly bandwidth and supposedly twice the upload speed, but in reality its still barely 100 Kbps (instead of the up to 256 K).
Is there any sort of alternative to these 2 companies for satellite internet? I'd pay more $$ to get something that gave better more consistent
performance, perhaps even roll up VOIP and internet in one package. Starband does offer commercial grade service but its like $400 a month, plus new
equipment. Does VOIP use up a lot of bandwidth I wonder?
\"There is a theory which states that if ever anyone discovers exactly what the Universe is for and why it is here, it will instantly disappear
and be replaced by something even more bizarre and inexplicable.There is another theory which states that this has already happened\"
Douglas Adams
our website: http://bajadarkskies.com |
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monoloco
Elite Nomad
Posts: 6667
Registered: 7-13-2009
Location: Pescadero BCS
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Have you looked into the Telcel 3g modem? It works good for me and supports my majicjack with no problems.
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MrBillM
Platinum Nomad
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Alternatives ?
A High-Gain External antenna and good Cracking software ?
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BCSTech
Senior Nomad
Posts: 584
Registered: 4-16-2006
Location: Todos Santos, BCS / Placerville, CA.
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Alternatives to StarBad and UsedNut
| Quote: | | Originally posted by astrobaja Is there any sort of alternative to these 2 companies for satellite internet? I'd pay more $$ to get something
that gave better more consistent performance, perhaps even roll up VOIP and internet in one package. Starband does offer commercial grade service but
its like $400 a month, plus new equipment. Does VOIP use up a lot of bandwidth I wonder? |
VSAT Systems using
iDirect or ViaSat platforms are available but, you're right, they can be a little pricey compared to SB or HN. SB's commercial service is in this
league.
In any event, you'll still need new equipment. You can reuse your 1.2 meter StarBand dish, tho, for what it's worth. You'll need a new modem and
outdoor electronics, probably around $2,200 to $2,500 if you know what you're doing and shop. Monthly service starts at $150 per month, and there are
a number of service providers to choose from.
But... most of these "commercial" service providers offer a guaranteed service level, there are fewer users competing with you on your same channel,
and you can use VoIP, no problem. They're built to support it.
The problem with VoIP is not so much that it uses a lot of bandwidth, but it's more an issue with the amount of delay and jitter over satellite - the
delay in getting signals to and from the satellite and back, and variations in the spaces between the little data packets. When these are high, VoIP
doesn't like it at all.
Also you need good, stable up speed. Most common complaint with VoIP over sat is that you can hear the caller but they can't hear you. That's a
problem with your upload speed being too low or too variable.
We like VSATs because we can talk to the service techs directly, and they know we're in Mexico and it doesn't matter. No playing games, or having to
look up the weather conditions for some fake address in the US before calling tech support "How's the weather there in Houston?" "Gee, I dunno, I'm
not there right now...d'oh!"
Downside? Unless you watch what you're doing, you can use up a lot of data and go over your monthly plan limit on these systems. Unlike SN and HN,
many of these services charge by the MB when you go over your limit. One customer we had ran up an $800 bill the first month. The service provider was
flexible, tho, and forgave a good portion of that. Higher service level plans avoid this.
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astrobaja
Senior Nomad
Posts: 952
Registered: 5-22-2006
Location: near San Pedro Martir Park
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Thanks for that Alan
You pretty much confirmed what I suspected. Regular service on either Hughes or Starband means you get UP a certain level but the reality is that up
and down speeds vary greatly depending on network congestion, this is why voip works so erratically. The premium commercial grade plans assure certain
levels of speed, but for this you pay a fair bit more, which is to be expected. Wondering if these companies will ever come down say 30-40% in their
prices? I expect not as these types of plans have a limited customer base. For me the rolling weekly bandwidth of 5 gig works out pretty well, when we
get our astronomy B&B up and running we will need that bandwidth as astronomers are big time techno geeks!
Have to wait and see if Starbands moving to a new bird will eventually make for better more consistent speeds, perhaps my voip will be more stable
then...
\"There is a theory which states that if ever anyone discovers exactly what the Universe is for and why it is here, it will instantly disappear
and be replaced by something even more bizarre and inexplicable.There is another theory which states that this has already happened\"
Douglas Adams
our website: http://bajadarkskies.com |
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astrobaja
Senior Nomad
Posts: 952
Registered: 5-22-2006
Location: near San Pedro Martir Park
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Mood: beam me up
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Mono,
We have little to no cell coverage here, but there is a new cell tower being put up down in San Telmo so perhaps in the future it could be a solution.
\"There is a theory which states that if ever anyone discovers exactly what the Universe is for and why it is here, it will instantly disappear
and be replaced by something even more bizarre and inexplicable.There is another theory which states that this has already happened\"
Douglas Adams
our website: http://bajadarkskies.com |
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Riom
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Posts: 492
Registered: 12-17-2004
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| Quote: | Originally posted by astrobaja
For me the rolling weekly bandwidth of 5 gig works out pretty well, |
The Telcel 3G has FAP limits as well: 3GB per month for prepaid (around $50/mo), 3GB/mo and 10GB/mo for long contracts ($35 and $50).
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roadhog
Nomad
Posts: 105
Registered: 10-29-2009
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The conversation is about internet satellite reception at Baja ?
I asked Hughes about Baja. Hughes said, no reception for Baja.
The interest is using:
http://earthquake.usgs.gov/earthquakes/recenteqsus/
https://sslearthquake.usgs.gov/ens/?page=help
for research, not an on-site seismograph unit.
The potential equipment mounts on/in a Ford van.
Any ideas on power consumption/hr ?
Is this possible ?
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BCSTech
Senior Nomad
Posts: 584
Registered: 4-16-2006
Location: Todos Santos, BCS / Placerville, CA.
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Mood: Carpe Manana
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UsedNut will not knowingly offer their service outside the US but it does work in Baja all the way to Cabo San Lucas.
If you go with them be sure you do not get an HN9000 modem. It WILL NOT work in almost all of Baja and moving it anywhere outside of a few miles from
its US installation point will cause it to deactivate.
[Edited on 11-11-2009 by BCSTech]
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BCSTech
Senior Nomad
Posts: 584
Registered: 4-16-2006
Location: Todos Santos, BCS / Placerville, CA.
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Mood: Carpe Manana
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HughesNet power supplies are rated for 64 watts.
Yes, it is possible to have a mobile unit. If you're moving around a lot and USGS is paying for it, get a DataStorm motorized unit that will
automatically find the satellite no matter where you are. Very pricey but saves a lot of setup time.
[Edited on 11-11-2009 by BCSTech]
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roadhog
Nomad
Posts: 105
Registered: 10-29-2009
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Alan, suggest an ideal BAJA mobile system for receiving USGS data ?
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roadhog
Nomad
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Registered: 10-29-2009
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Alan,
read your business site. Hughes gives the equipment away, Idirect costs 3500 up.
How is that ?
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viabaja
Nomad
Posts: 277
Registered: 10-6-2003
Location: Georgia
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Astrobaja - Hughes Net SUCKS!! I have had them for 2 years up here in the high desert (calif). If Verizon ever decides to run fiber out to where we
live, I will drop them like a hot rock. Hughes Net promises everything, but delivers NADA. One pays for a set service and the only time you get it is
a 2 AM! I'm told Starband is the same way. If you call for service, you will be speaking to someone in India. There ought to be a class action law
suit against Hughes for false advertising. Also, ever since they "upgraded" their email service, our 3rd party email service/downloads has slowed down
big time, notably around 5 PM. go figure.
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BCSTech
Senior Nomad
Posts: 584
Registered: 4-16-2006
Location: Todos Santos, BCS / Placerville, CA.
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| Quote: | Originally posted by roadhog
Alan, read your business site. Hughes gives the equipment away, Idirect costs 3500 up. How is that ? |
HughesNet is consumer-grade US only, and iDirect commercial-grade international. We can't get either system and ship it/import it to
Mexico for free.
[Edited on 11-13-2009 by BCSTech]
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larryC
Super Nomad
Posts: 1499
Registered: 8-11-2008
Location: BoLA
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astro
My starband has been working very well for the last 2 weeks, before that voip was unusable. Seems that Starband is trying to get it togegher after the
switch to the new sat. Not sure what you are complaining about, is it a problem with not enough gig allowance per week? Or is your voip not working
well? I just have the residential service at $50 per month, uploads are only 30 to 40 kb sec, but that is enough for now to make the service usable
for us. My wife talks to our daughter for an hour or more and only misses a few words in that time. We use Magicjack. Since you have the 1500 service,
did you install the 2 watt transmitter? I have seen some accounts where the customer upgrades but the dealer did not send out the upgraded
transmitter. I assume you are repointed to 121 sat, do you know what your EBno is? You can view that in the Skymanage page. A low EBno will make your
system erratic and cause it to drop service occasionally. Low EBno can be caused by a couple of different things, poor dish aiming, bad wire or
connection in the receive circuit or a LNB going bad. Check your LNB, a .5db is what you want. If you are getting FAPed did you know that if you do
large downloads between the hours of 9pm and 3 am PST, that those downloads do not count against you.
I am a Starband installer and if I can help, or you have any questions I'll try to answer them.
Larry
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astrobaja
Senior Nomad
Posts: 952
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Location: near San Pedro Martir Park
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Hi Larry,
Very much appreciate your advice and help here! We did upgrade to the 1500 package and the installer Roberto came to do the repoint and install the
new 2W transmitter. He did forget to change the workshop address from 256 to 257, but with his help via e-mail I got into the modem setup page to
change it. When you talk about the EBno parameter is it in the same setup page as the workshop info? If so I know how to get to it to check.
We too use Magicjack but get very poor results especially with the other end hearing us, this was the case with the 1000 plan and continues to be the
case with the 1500. I use various sites to test down & upload speeds and get very varied results (depending on time of day, so presumably network
loads factor in here) download speeds range from 0.51-1.12 Mb/s
and upload are between 0.04-0.09 Kbps. According to the speed test sites these figures are 30-50% below what the average starband user is
experiencing, so not sure if that is accurate or not. I go to the starband.net site to see my bandwidth usage so I'm not getting Fap'ed. I will check
the EBno to see what that is....
\"There is a theory which states that if ever anyone discovers exactly what the Universe is for and why it is here, it will instantly disappear
and be replaced by something even more bizarre and inexplicable.There is another theory which states that this has already happened\"
Douglas Adams
our website: http://bajadarkskies.com |
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BCSTech
Senior Nomad
Posts: 584
Registered: 4-16-2006
Location: Todos Santos, BCS / Placerville, CA.
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To change your download schedule in Windows XP and others, go to Start > Settings > Control Panel > Scheduled Tasks.
Double Click on any program entries you find there, click the Schedule tab, and change the download time to start at 9PM BCN or 10 PM BCS. This will
help ensure your downloads finish before 3 AM Pacific time.
Next, go to Start > Settings > Control Panel > Automatic Updates, and do the same thing there, changing the download time to start at 9PM BCN
or 10 PM BCS.
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larryC
Super Nomad
Posts: 1499
Registered: 8-11-2008
Location: BoLA
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Astro
Alan has some good advice, just be aware that if you start a down load at 8:59 by accident then all of that download will be charged to your account
so I usually start mine at 9:05 just to be sure.
As far as the EBno, it is found on the Skymanage "status" page, on the left side click the "telemetry" tab. It should be better than a 5 and hopefully
in the 7 or 8 range. Alan mentioned in a previous post that you have a 1.2 meter dish is that correct? If so then your numbers should even be better
than 8. You say that "Roberto" didn't configure the 257 into the modem, did the modem work before he left? On the modems that I have misconfigured,
the 4th light would never come on, which is a hint that it is configured wrong and needs to be redone.
Another possibility for the poor Magicjack performance is that your computer may need to be cleaned up. A freind of mine was having similar problems
and he ended up taking his computer up to San Diego and having someone up there basically reload the operating system and his voip worked much better.
I guess a good test for you could be to try a different computer on your modem and see if that makes any difference. One more possibility is to get
your dealer to have your account reassigned to the other cluster, (there are only 2, either 90 or 91) maybe that would help. Anyway look at Skymanage
and see what your EBno is and then we can go from there. we can also do this u2u but I thought that someone else might benefit that is having
problems.
Larry
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BCSTech
Senior Nomad
Posts: 584
Registered: 4-16-2006
Location: Todos Santos, BCS / Placerville, CA.
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| Quote: | | Originally posted by larryCAlan mentioned in a previous post that you have a 1.2 meter dish is that correct? |
oops, my assumption, based only on installations I've seen in BCS!
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astrobaja
Senior Nomad
Posts: 952
Registered: 5-22-2006
Location: near San Pedro Martir Park
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Hi Larry and Alan,
I actually have the 0.75 meter dish, I was told I id not need the 1.2 being that I was on Baja Norte. I went to the telemetry page on the modem and I
have a good EBno. of 8.7!
I think Starband may have streamlined their service as I'm getting much faster upload speeds usually between 70-160 kbps! This has been for the last
2 days so MagicJack works a fair bit better!
Good point on the Windows updates and waiting till after nine to do high bandwidth stuff. The only big bandwidth stuff I do is online streaming video
from Netflix and I wait till like 5-10 minutes after 9.
\"There is a theory which states that if ever anyone discovers exactly what the Universe is for and why it is here, it will instantly disappear
and be replaced by something even more bizarre and inexplicable.There is another theory which states that this has already happened\"
Douglas Adams
our website: http://bajadarkskies.com |
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