Wildblue Internet feedback?

[codeman671]

I am thinking of putting in Wildblue satellite internet through NHEC at the island, does anyone have experience good or bad with the service?

[Island Girl]

What will be the cost of installation.. and monthly fees? and what are the promised upload and download speeds. Will VPN work?

[codeman671]

I have the paperwork here on my desk, it is a $300 setup fee and a 2 year commitment. There are 3 packages:

$49.95 for 512k down, 128k up
$69.95 for 1mb down, 200k up
$79.95 for 1.5mb down, 256k up

not sure of vpn, I would imagine it would be fine.

Speeds are not completely guaranteed, especially on the uploads. They do offer email address, web space, spam/virus filtering ,etc included. They do also allow for a seasonal shutoff, you only have to pay $20 per month over the winter. I think that they may offer a month to month option as well but there were some catches.

[Island Girl]

It looks like they have monthly quotas on data...

Latency is usually the problem with VPN... if you install it.. I would like to come and try it out.. I really need a high speed solution..

[Bear Islander]

I have had Directway satellite internet for years, it's now called HughesNet. It's much better than dial up, the speed is good, but the latency can be annoying. We will be switching to cable in a couple of weeks.

If either of you want to try it out let me know.

[twins]

We were one of the first to get it last spring. The underwater phone line to our island went bad over the winter and the phone company wanted $5000 to replace it! Satellite was our only option for internet access. We have been very satisfied with it. You need to have direct line of sight to their satellite and occasionally on cloudy days the connection can be lost for a few seconds. Also there is some latency (nothing you would notice). They say Voice over IP won't work, but I'm going to try our Vonage box this summer anyway. I don't see any reason why VPN wouldn't work, but you would want to check with them to make sure they don't alter the packet during transmission. There's no usage limits.

There is also an extra charge if they have to put the dish on a pole instead of the house. We didn't want ours near the house so we made sure we had the tools necessary for the digging. You'll have to pick them up and bring their equipment in your boat.

I'd recommend it, but on the other hand we went a month with no internet, phone or TV (don't have one). Just me, my wife, 2 three year olds and 4 dogs (remember "The Shining"?) so I was easy to make happy!

[Knot Droolin']

Geosynchronous orbit is around 20K miles above the earth. If you are doing anything but web surfing latency will be a large issue. VOIP will be a mess if it works at all. VPN should work but as Codeman said the upload speed will drop depending on the number of users on the node (sat) you are connecting to or simply due to weather. TCP resend traffic can also be a nightmare if packets are dropped during bad weather.

If you plan to VPN for email such as Outlook, that should be no problem. If you plan to run applications over the VPN, that will be painful. Speeds are similar to Verizon wireless but latency will be alot higher simply due to the speed of light; 20K miles up and 20K miles down, then onto the internet somewhere on earth, accross the internet to the server you are connecting to, and then back again to your PC. Quite a long trip, no?

Any problems firing up your VPN (I am assuming IPSEC is the protocol) then the most likely culprit is MTU size. Reduce it. Also use UDP as the connection protocol rather than TCP, less overhead for the connect.

Good luck!

[Lakegeezer]

How does the Wildblue satellite system work for uploaded traffic? I worked with one system that used dial-up for transmit and the satellite for receive. As a result, there were two IP addresses and the IPSEC VPN would not connect. More modern SSL style VPNs may work fine, but I haven't played with one yet. Roundtrip latency through a satellite link is about 1/4 second.

[Parker Island Fun]

we have the serivice on our island and have had no issues--yet! i work from my office i mean my porch, my my shorts and no one is the wiser. it makes those long weekends even longer.

[Knot Droolin']

How does the Wildblue satellite system work for uploaded traffic? I worked with one system that used dial-up for transmit and the satellite for receive. As a result, there were two IP addresses and the IPSEC VPN would not connect. More modern SSL style VPNs may work fine, but I haven't played with one yet. Roundtrip latency through a satellite link is about 1/4 second.

All modern systems are send/recieve from the dish, no dialup, so asymetrical routing issues with having two IPs will not be an issue any longer. Round trip times are closer to (or above) 500 milliseconds (1/2 second). The math is easy for the latency: average 45K miles up and down and back again for 90k miles round trip. this is not including the distance the packet must travel on the Internet backbone. Speed of light is ~180,000 per second so you get 500 milliseconds.

This is REALLY slow in computer terms. For comparison, good cable Interet will give you sub 20 millisecond latency and 56K dialup modem will be around 100 milliseconds.

Here is a good FAQ from a provider:

http://www.spidersat.net/faqs_ip_over_satellite.htm#FAQItem10

[KBoater]

That phone line was laid in 1991 at a cost of $865. It was laid between the islands on the surface of the bottom by walking it across. The cost of living has gone up. The power line was laid in 1994 was marine grade and cost $7500.
Inflation is wonderful.

[jellybean]

My folks live on a remote ranch in the western US where cable or DSL are not an option, and probably never will be. They recently moved from dialup to Wildblue and are VERY happy with it! I can't answer any of the technical questions about the service, and of course it's through a different local provider than NHEC, but they seem to like it for "normal" internet use.

[EricP]

All modern systems are send/recieve from the dish, no dialup, so asymetrical routing issues with having two IPs will not be an issue any longer. Round trip times are closer to (or above) 500 milliseconds (1/2 second). The math is easy for the latency: average 45K miles up and down and back again for 90k miles round trip. this is not including the distance the packet must travel on the Internet backbone. Speed of light is ~180,000 per second so you get 500 milliseconds.

This is REALLY slow in computer terms. For comparison, good cable Interet will give you sub 20 millisecond latency and 56K dialup modem will be around 100 milliseconds.

Here is a good FAQ from a provider:

http://www.spidersat.net/faqs_ip_over_satellite.htm#FAQItem10
I am curious if you have ever used a satellite Internet connection? Your assesment here is way of target. I had satellite connestions for years, starting with the one-way modem style to the 2 way dish only style. And while satellite is not as fast as land lines, it is tolerable. I have used a variety of vpn style connections and agree I wouldn't want to have to run applications, but I have out of neccessity. My advice is if you have no other options then it's a good choice.

The latency values you reference are not realistsic. I have never seen 20 millisecond latency on dsl or cable unless your pinging the computer right next to you. And it is depebndent on where you're going so quoting latency values is relative to the task at hand.

[codeman671]

I ended up with Hughesnet at the recommendation of the installer. He does both Wildblue and Hughes and pointed us in this direction. The install was almost $1000 everything said and done. It seems to be decent, after running speed tests we found it to be above advertised speeds although it fluctuates throughout the day.

[wifi]

There are also a few wireless internet providers in the Lakes Region area. Probably cheaper than satelite, if you can 'see' their antenna.