Sattelite Internet Service

Has any used this type of ISP service or familiar with it? I live in the land of dial up and its the only possible upgrade we have for a few years yet. Its a bit of change to get set up and for the equipment so trying it out to see if we like it is out of the question.

I considered it when we switched from Comcast to DirecTv, but then Comcast bribed me with a $30/month bill for basic cable (for our bedroom) and internet. I would think the only problem you would have is the same thing with any satellite service, if it's storming you aren't going to have it. When I was looking into it I know the equipment was salty (in the $150 range), but if it runs equal to or better then cable, I'd say go for it.

I haven't looked at satellite internet in several years. When I did check into it the cost was substantial, around $600 just to get it set up, so I didn't pursue it any further at that point.
From what I am told, the speed for general internet use is great. Due to the unavoidable lag, it isn't good for gaming. Regardless of how fast the connection is the return packets must still travel the distance to the satellite and back to earth and the time it takes to do that can't be improved. The lag is only an issue with gaming though and isn't noticed otherwise.

As for storms knocking it out, it has to be a really severe storm with an abnormally thick cloud layer. My satellite TV only has that issue once or twice a year at most for an hour or so during an extreme storm.

I've had my DirecTv go out in mild storms. Only 15-60 minutes at a time, but still irritating. That's how we always know it's yucky out...The tv goes weird.

That's weird how it affects you worse. Maybe it's where you're farther north, or perhaps your dish is not quite dead on the satellite I don't know. It takes a storm of almost scary proportions to knock my signal out.
Snow is a lot worse of a problem here than rain. Snow collects on the dish fairly quick if it's a heavy wet snow.

The cheapest set up fee we've found so far is $500 for the equipment installed and the PC set up with a $60 monthly fee.

The funniest thing is the main cable line is less than a mile down the street but the cable company won't run it on our road because we haven't bulldozed the trees and filled the area with tract housing.

Originally Posted by BryonsBoas

The cheapest set up fee we've found so far is $500 for the equipment installed and the PC set up with a $60 monthly fee.

The funniest thing is the main cable line is less than a mile down the street but the cable company won't run it on our road because we haven't bulldozed the trees and filled the area with tract housing.

Know anybody that you could House a Modem/Router in their house for you?

You could get http://www.radiolabs.com/products/wi...ss-antenna.php
A pair of them, and set one up at your house, and the other at your very awesome friend's house ( paying for your own line in of cable/DSL)

Cheaper if you just want internet. Some of them can go up to three miles if the area is uncleared from point A to Point B.

Worth thinking about at least

We had satellite internet at our house for a while because it was the only option other than dial-up. It's definitely beats dial-up by a long shot. It was pretty fast on most things. One thing to watch for is there is probably a 30 day bandwidth usage limit. If you go over, they will slow you down until the usage drops. If it's your only option other then dial-up, I'd say go for it. We were pretty happy with it, but even happier when DSL finally came to our area.

Todd Breese

That's a good idea, Alicia!

Originally Posted by Mooing Tricycle

Know anybody that you could House a Modem/Router in their house for you?

You could get http://www.radiolabs.com/products/wi...ss-antenna.php
A pair of them, and set one up at your house, and the other at your very awesome friend's house ( paying for your own line in of cable/DSL)

Cheaper if you just want internet. Some of them can go up to three miles if the area is uncleared from point A to Point B.

Worth thinking about at least

If the county allows me to put up the rodent buildings and reptile i want I could use those. We live in the foothills with mucho trees and low / high spots. We only have line of sight with one neighbor and they have the same issues we do.