Satellite Internet?

[Sytes]

We got in on the beta testing, so it cost $500 to sign up, and it's $99/mo with no data caps or throttling.

How does it work with cell phone via wifi? That is our one main hurdle and if it works then we are sold as well.

 

[hank4elk]

I actually talked to a tech with Hughes and we tried switching channels on the router& it worked better for a few days....lol From what he said I was not exceeding any allotment per mo.

I watched 2 netflix movies & it started buffering again. I can watch Joe Rogan on spotify,in the early morning or late night. Took twice as long to watch a Randy video than it should.
Streaming seems to be the issue,it then slows the internet down. It takes time to use the internet still.
Dial up goes out all the time here.

I did not ask about gen 5 when I called 2 weeks ago. I am on 4 gig now and it's about $160...confusing person to talk to. I just asked what amount do folks get when they have kids and all? Does it cost $500 a mo to run a businesss speed model? She was rude(my nice word),said turn the computer off when I'm not using it....lol

Saw an add for starlink while watching Brett & Heather podcast this afternoon. You tube works @ on and off speeds. It also depends on what. Popular stuff takes longer...it all seems so rigged.

I did have to brush off the snow on dishes recently. Snow loads have stopped the link. T-storms when power goes out...

 

[hank4elk]

How does it work with cell phone via wifi? That is our one main hurdle and if it works then we are sold as well.

I would ditch Dish, hughesnet & Verizon in a heartbeat if it worked out here in rural NM.
Does starlink get routed to tv to watch? Or are you stuck viewing on phone or PC?

 

[Ben Lamb]

I would ditch Dish, hughesnet & Verizon in a heartbeat if it worked out here in rural NM.
Does starlink get routed to tv to watch? Or are you stuck viewing on phone or PC?

Hank,

It's just like any other ISP - just comes in over your modem & router. If you have a smart tv or something like chromecast/firestick you can easily stream everything.

How does it work with cell phone via wifi? That is our one main hurdle and if it works then we are sold as well.

Charles,

I haven't tried it with wifi phones yet. I'm waiting on the service to be a bit more rock steady before jettisoning Verizon & going with google-fi. Hopefully that occurs next week.

 

[hank4elk]

Hank,

It's just like any other ISP - just comes in over your modem & router. If you have a smart tv or something like chromecast/firestick you can easily stream everything.


Charles,

I haven't tried it with wifi phones yet. I'm waiting on the service to be a bit more rock steady before jettisoning Verizon & going with google-fi. Hopefully that occurs next week.

Thanks Ben. I do have smart tv & my sony blueray player is the router...I think,LOL.

 

[BourbonSnowCone]

I've been running starlink for the last 3 weeks now, and I'm sold. There are still issues, but the speeds are fantastic. I need to get a better location for the dish, as I have obstructed views & the router they supply isn't very good, with a lot of drops, so it's not great for videoconferencing until I get a new router & place the dish on the roof where it has an unobstructed view of the North sky.

We got in on the beta testing, so it cost $500 to sign up, and it's $99/mo with no data caps or throttling.

We had viasat when we first got here, and it was sold as the best, but they throttle even if you haven't reached you caps (which took us about a week between working from home & streaming services). I gladly paid the $350 early termination fee, and the $500 for starlink because even after paying that, I'm not out any more money than what viasat was charging me ($180 per month).

I second and third Starlink. One month into the Beta and the speeds are awesome and we've had little to no downtime. A little more expensive for startup but absolutely worth it. Obstructions can be a pain but all satellite is that way. The app shows you the best place for the dish. Elon Musk is going to rule the world.

 

[Elevationwerks]

Owned a Hughes commercial service franchise for years. In a nutshell, the latency issues of bouncing your signal to a satellite and back will never meet today's expectations of streaming and Wi-Fi usage. Only as a last resort with no other options should it be used. Look for a fixed wireless provider.

 

[hank4elk]

I checked & it's due in my area mid-late 2021.
There are no obstructions for sat. dishes here.
Cell is only tower service now,and there are hills in direct line of sight. Even with new 5g towers along 60(ATT,suppossedly) my verizon service gets worse every day,mifi is a joke. 12 years ago there was excellent cell & internet with them.
Heard Dish has a streaming(delay) now but still no internet besides the hughes I got thru them....

 

[44hunter45]

I run Hughes net gen 5. I didn't get the minimum plan but the next step up. Honestly it works pretty decent. I can stream Netflix/prime all the time. I've never screwed with tokens or even really checked my bandwidth usage but I'm almost certain throttled back still lets me stream consistently . I don't do internet calls, skype, and for some reason youtube videos seem to take a while. Really bad weather rain/heavy snow screws things up.

All that said, I live in a community way off the Alaska road system with no cell phone data. I might not have the same baseline that others have. Sometime things take a few minutes to load and I've had lower 48 friends get frustrated while on my Wi-Fi. Gen 5 is way better then starband was or the earlier Hughes net system. Hope that is helpful.

I'm on Gen 5 HughesNet. 20/50 Plan. My experience has been a bit different. I cannot stream at all. I cannot watch any video higher than 480 resolution.

Complaints to HughesNet resulted in them saying the contract only covers 480p.

 

[Walkathon]

I had Hughes net once. I asked many questions about the service prior to signing up and was assured it would meet my needs. It sucked, bad. Really bad. Dealing with them was hands down the worst experience I've ever had with a service provider. Never, ever again will I use them. Ever. They finally ran lines for Century Link high speed, hard wired service in my area and I switched to it. Century Link still has some issues, but nothing close to the Hughes issues I had.

 

[Bowmannate2000]

See if you can get starlink. I know two people that have it. It's a game changer for rural internet.

 

[406LIFE]

I've had Starlink for a couple months now. Simply incredible. Occasional outage that lasts for a minute. There was one down time of one hour that they warned me about as they adjusted satellite. I know they say it doesn't travel with you to the woods...but I think it can.

 

[Sytes]

I've had Starlink for a couple months now.

Have you tried using your cell phone over wifi?

 

[406LIFE]

Have you tried using your cell phone o

I have wifi calling turned on, since I cant turn it off. I haven't really noticed any difference.

 

[hank4elk]

Have you tried using your cell phone over wifi?

I had wifi (verizon) here, when I moved here & I used my cell phone & pc all over NM to file reports,with hundreds of pictures...a flip phone too. Worked great for about 2 years.Then verizon started buffered the signal and in one month and I got a bill for 60gb,that I did not use. I dumped them as I don't work with crooks....

My cell phone worked great even without the wifi on, here at home,all over the ranch. Now the phone works if I'm sitting in one spot on the couch and get one,two bars of signal with mifi and the call can drop.With a signal booster......even my 911 call got dropped 6 years ago when I had a HA.
The mifi does not work at all with the pc here at the ranch,but works just fine in a verizon office,150mi from home.
I have out the door verizon service and their service sucks. Going to dump the mifi this week too.

12 years ago I could get a verizon signal all over NM,even in many places in the Gila. It, cell service, is a racket,by con men,sales weasels ,now. With terrible service.

I called dish and I qualified for free upgrade and will be able to stream most of the video content I use thru the "hopper",what ever that is. Guy is coming Sunday to install new equipment,the same guy who also services hughesnet....dish guy. I'll see if he can boast the hughes while he's here too.
I'll have to use hughesnet for spotify and amazon prime,e-mail & internet searches.
Lucky for me I do not use internet for research & sending & receiving loads of data much anymore. Glad I don't have a business or a family these days, either.

Not going to wait the 6-9 mo to see if I can get skylink here.............that means 6-9 years in sales weasel speak to me. And I refuse to use a stupid little cell screen on a cell phone surf the web when I have a pc that has a router,wifi,etc., and a screen I can see without going blind.
Why can't I just use my PC as a cell phone if they all have the same equipment as each other? My samsung 4g cell has more of a 'puter in it than my 1st 3 pc's. Why can't any of these things work between each other without signals being dropped or buffering?

Am I just an old fart with half a brain and just understanding folks these days is a trial. No one can just speak in plain simple English anymore either.

I'm also going to find out which cell service & internet these traveling contract workers use in NM now.

 

[Muleyewyo90]

We’ve had hughesnet for about a year and haven’t been impressed at all. I have the mid-range package and pay around $100/mo. Wind and snow interrupt the dish signal terribly, we aren’t able to stream an entire movie without interruptions, and their customer service is poor. Visionary broadband recently put up some towers in our area and I plan to try them out after the 2 year contract is up.

 

[Trial153]

Starlink is the way to go compared Hughes net according to friends that had both. They are north of the border and involved in the testing of the service.

 

[hank4elk]

We just entered Starlink Beta. They are focused on rural markets. Outside rural they are typically taking hold orders until end of this year.

Starlink costs approx $550 then $99 a month. We're saying hasta to Directv and CenturyLink. So... well see. Elon and his SpaceX programs are pretty slick. Cell phone use, they just placed with FCC for pricing.

Basically, intent is to turn cell into Sat phones - globally. Bit down the road though that's an epic move to have a cell phone in the mountains as a sat phone.

Current use for cell via Starlink is supposedly the same ability through out wifi at home- with far greater than connectivity than CenturyLink and that's our current use at home.

Starlink:


CenturyLink @ our location:

View attachment 175042

If any interested to see if available in your area... reviews seem to be promising. I have no personal experience. Waiting 4-6 weeks for equipment.

Starlink

High-speed internet. Available almost anywhere on Earth.

www.starlink.com

HT must have flooded the link. It's gone now.....lol.
I did get in on initial offer the other day,but like I said the reply was service expected for me in mid-late 2021. It was a search based on zip codes,address'.
Just now did a goggle search for more info and the coverage maps are mostly in north US and a couple counties elsewhere.
Elon is driven I guess. I sure hope starlink helps us unserved folks in US. Could be a game changer for rural schools,business'!

 

[AndyPOW]

I run Hughes net gen 5. I didn't get the minimum plan but the next step up. Honestly it works pretty decent. I can stream Netflix/prime all the time. I've never screwed with tokens or even really checked my bandwidth usage but I'm almost certain throttled back still lets me stream consistently . I don't do internet calls, skype, and for some reason youtube videos seem to take a while. Really bad weather rain/heavy snow screws things up.

All that said, I live in a community way off the Alaska road system with no cell phone data. I might not have the same baseline that others have. Sometime things take a few minutes to load and I've had lower 48 friends get frustrated while on my Wi-Fi. Gen 5 is way better then starband was or the earlier Hughes net system. Hope that is helpful.

Same experience here in Whale Pass. No cell service, and love it. Don't miss it a bit. No reason for the students at school to have cell phones. Heavenly. Local calls are four digits and free.

 

[Sytes]

This weekend, wife and I assembled three 1-1/2" emt pipes together and affixed it to the side of our chimney. Pic below presents the trees the little satellite content with for our signal. Too close to our house for my skill level to drop... have a couple companies coming to view the next couple days. See if price fits our internet speed interest.






Next on our to do list, viewing this last photo it really stands out though aside the thread intent... cedar siding pressure wash and re-stain, seal. Joy.

Heavy wind today and not typical for this location. Good to see our setup endure it pretty well.

Signal strength blows the living snot out of our rural CenturyLink.

I switched between the two just now to match speeds using an independent speed test service (my favored of the bunch).

Speakeasy Internet Speed Test - Check Your Broadband Speed | Fusion Connect

Check your internet speeds with our online speed test. Fusion Connect is your cloud solution provider for VoIP, UC, hosted service, internet & secure networking. Call today!

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CenturyLink:



Starlink: