Satellite Services

[georgenoise]

I'm curious to know what satellite service everyone recommends or has experience with. I have a lot of customers that live in areas that have to choose between satellite or dialup and now I myself have moved into an area like that. I've read reports, looked at reviews but we all know how that is and I'd rather get my info from a community of people with some knowledge. I'd ask my customers that have satellite service but once again, it's the knowledgeable answers I'm looking for. Thanks in advance guys.

 

[SilverLeaf]

I'm in the same boat at the moment. Currently, I tether my android phone when I am at home. I looked into satellite a couple of times, but just can't bring myself to do it. While the speeds have gotten better over the last few years, there are still several drawbacks with many providers. Some things to watch out for:

* Huge latency
* Data caps
* Multi-year contracts
* Equipment rental fees
* Weather interference

That said, if I couldn't get a 3G signal for my phone, I'd probably have to go this route.

 

[chrisaroz]

http://www.exede.com/
Be warned, there sign-up process as a reseller is one of the most cumbersome I've done.

 

[katz]

Hughesnet is the big one in my area. It is slow, expensive, and the latency is awful. It almost seems that dial up is faster. I don't recommend it to anyone in my area.

They keep promising upgrades to the system, but I never see any difference. Unfortunately, the customer gets talked into a multi-year contract before they talk to me, so they are stuck with it for a long time.

 

[glricht]

Both Verizon and AT&T (may be more) offer a "mi-fi" unit. The Mi-Fi 2200 is popular here in central Florida. It offers wireless access almost everywhere, even while on the road. Can be connected directly via USB, or can act as a stand-alone wireless router.

I have a couple of customers that had no Internet access except for dial until the mi-fi became available. The mi-fi isn't super hi-speed, but it's not bad. I even have have a 3-PC SMB customer using it as a wireless router for the entire office.

Here's a link to a Verizon unit http://www.verizonwireless.com/b2c/mobilebroadband/?page=products_mifi

 

[krtechsolutions]

Start a WISP, this is what I did,

Once you get a few customers under your belt and your name gets around it will grow like little crazy.

Also People are also going to need Internet and recurring revenue is awesome!!!

 

[brock029]

I recently found out that dish network offers internet and voip phones too. They have pretty good speeds I think up to 12 down.

 

[krtechsolutions]

12Mpbs on a sat connection is like sucking a golf ball through a garden hose, just don't work!!!

 

['putertutor]

12Mpbs on a sat connection is like sucking a golf ball through a garden hose, just don't work!!!

Where's Bernie when you need him??

Back to point. I have a few customers on Hughes, and to be blunt, it sucks and blows at the same time. If they had a decent cell signal I would hook them up to Verizon's mifi service, which doesn't break any speed limits itself. As it is, the Hughes is better than dial up, but that's a pretty low bar.

The Verizon deal, which I used for about a year myself, wasn't too speedy, and had caps, but it worked for basic email, shopping, etc. Forget about streaming anything, and I mean anything, even audio. Of course that was back in the pre LTE days, which we probably won't have around here for at least another year anyway.