Satellite internet providers???Forum: Hardware Talk Topic: Satellite internet providers??? started by: hawki Posted by hawki on Aug. 09 2005,13:17
HiAs a rural internet user I have never had broadband internet service. Does anyone have experience with satellite service? I am researching two two-way providers and one one-way provider. If anyone can steer me to or away from them please do. 1. Wildblue - Two-way satellite- new - pricing seems to be comparable with DSL/cable after original install. Unknown yet if it will work with Linux. 2. Starband - Two-way satellite- been around a while- pricing seems to be a little higher- appears to need M$ operating system. 3. Skyway- phone line up/satellite down- seems to provide fair speed- least expensive- claims to work with Linux out of the box. Would appreciate any and all feedback before I make the leap. Thanks Posted by hawki on Oct. 02 2005,13:50
HiFollowup note: I went with WildBlue two-way satellite. I've had it about a month. So far so good. The advertised speed seems to be close. 512k down/ 128k up. It's a rather large dish mounted on the roof pointed southwest. It takes a little bit to get used to the latency of two-way satellite times but downloads and web pages load quickly. Their support knows nothing about linux so don't expect any help if you use DSLinux. In my case the satellite modem goes into a wireless router configured to get its IP address using DHCP. The router supplies IP address to my computers via DHCP. My only problems so far is that heavy rain kills the signal for short periods and for some reason I have yet to figure out, Skype packets appear to be filtered out. SO if anyone else gives it a try let me know how it turns out. good luck |