Satellite internet comparison

Why thank you Derek, for stating the obvious, you get a gold star. I see that even this group has wind-bags in it, just like the rest.

I think if you read my post again, the part where it says: I hope someone, here, can help me on this one:

It didn't say "Oh please, State-the-Obvious Man help me please", now did it.

Where is alt.internet.satellite anyway? I couldn't find it and I did a google search in groups.

-Tim

Hi Clarence-

We are about in the same boat you are in, except we don't get crap for a cell phone signal. Some days we can get one and others nothing. We are right on the edge of 2 towers and when the wind blows, so does our signal. I am in Michigan, between Lansing and Battle Creek.

I heard that wireless was getting a lot better though. I wish we could get something other than this damn direcway crap.

I was just hoping that someone in here could answer my post. I posted in the ne.internet.services and the alt.satellite.internet and I just wanted to expand my choices.

Thanks for the input Clarence.

-Tim

Hi John-

Where could I get a good external antenna? Is there one place that's better than others?

I thought about getting a booster, but that would only work for 1 phone. Could an antenna work with multiple phones?

Thanks.

-Tim

If you can get any kind of signal on your cell phone, try using an external cellular antenna pointed in the direction of the cell site. Install a yagi, dish, panel, or whatever antenna on your roof, and run the coax to your cell phone and do the docking station thing. Something like this:

of thumb is 6dB gain doubles your range. 12dB 4 times. Don't forget to substract coaxial cable losses. You'll need a fairly good signal to do cellular data reliably. There are also some timing restructions for some services which limit the maximum range.

Have you looked around for WISP (wireless ISP's) on 2.4Ghz or 5.7GHz? They tend to cover areas not serviced by DSL or cable modems. This one looks like it covers your area.

Yeah, and you immediately blow your cool at the first person that tries to send you to the proper newsgroup. I suggest you appologize before doing anything else.

Then you'd need to go to alt.internet.satellite, not a.i.wireless. This isn't a satellite user's group.

Thanks John and Jeff-

I think I will look into the antenna thing, at least for out cell phones.

Jeff, if you look at that map of Michigan Broadband, right in between Lansing and Battle Creek. We are located right in the middle, we miss the red. Hopefully someday we will get a bit more important. We have a small town, Nashville, that is about 10 miles west of us and they are a dead zone for cell phones. Nextel, Alltel, Verizon, nothing works in Nashville.

And Jeff, about Derek, he didn't try to help me by sending me to the proper newsgroup. He tried to let me know that I shouldn't be here. I didn't write in my post that this was the correct newsgroup, actually I wrote; "I hope someone, here, can help me on this one", meaning that I was searching anywhere possible and this seemed like a good place.

And Derek, maybe I shouldn't of blown up at you, but I am having a rough day and you didn't help. I only asked in your newsgroup because I did a search and there was 10 posts about Wild Blue in here. I am sorry for blowing up, I should of just let it slide.

-Tim

With the spread of high speed cellular communication, you might want to investigate whether that would be viable.

Where I used to live, there was no cable, thus no cable internet, the CO was 12 miles away, so no DSL, and dialup was 21000 on a good day.

But cell phones worked if you stood in the right place.

Cingular Laptop Connect EDGE-gprs can deliver speeds of 150KbpS. Verizon EV-DO is faster, but less widely available. Cingular is coming out with something faster "soon".

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[POSTED TO alt.internet.wireless - REPLY ON USENET PLEASE]

A good external antenna might well give you solid signal.

Two more thoughts, then. If an external antenna makes the cellphone usable, maybe that would work for data as well. (Or make your cellphone usable ;-)

has some cheap ones.

If someone with line of site to your place can get DSL or cable internet, you might be able to broker a deal with them, installing broadband where it works, and using it at your place.

The CO that served my area didn't have DSL, so there was no hope there, anyway. One of my neighbors got a T1 installed. I think that was $145 per month, but it was fast. He ran his office telephone on the same link, so it wound up being comparable in price to DirecWay. Looking now, maybe that was just a raw T-1 to his company, with no ISP attached.

Earthlink offers "Frame Relay". I think I had a 64K Frame Relay for $65 per month, but that was also without an ISP, just a point to point connection.

Some of these possibilities are too high priced as a replacement for dialup, but if you are already doing satellite, you are in to a different pricing tier.

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If you're just concerned with an Internet connection, a single outdoor antenna would seem to do the trick. You could also get separate antennas for your cell phones. Or you can get an active repeater to use with all your cellular devices, but that's a lot more expensive than just an antenna.

External antenna sources:

Jeff-

I have gotten a lot of good answers, just not from Derek.

You, especially, have been very helpful. And you didn't, not once, tell me to go elsewhere. And I thank you for that.

My zip is 49096, Vermontville, I actually live in Kalamo (no zip) and it's a blink and you miss it kind of place. And the neighbors wouldn't give a crap about anybody else around here, even if it meant faster internet. It seems that everyone dislikes everyone, behind everyone's backs.

And, for the record, my original post was about a comparison between Direcway and Wild Blue.

Thanks.

-Tim

I noticed the gap. What you do is contact the WISP and offer to supply them with additional customers. You may end up banging on doors and armtwisting neighbors. When a sufficiently large number of potential customers can be found, the WISP will usually arrange for service. Also, it the town finds broadband useful to the residents, some political armtisting will usually result in a contract with the cable or telco company in trade for a franchise. It really depends on the number of potential paying customers. However, 10 miles is a long way for wireless and might be impossible. Some of the new WiMax systems might do 10 miles, but it's still difficult (depending on terrain).

What's your zip code so I can search?

Try:

search for a wireless ISP. It dump quite a bit of unuseable WISP's but you can skim the list and see if anyone looks useable.

Here's another:

not very accurate for my area.

There are other lists...

I have a very simplistic view on posting to usenet. If you don't like to read what you are writing, then don't post it. If it's personal, use email. I doubt if there's a single person that reads alt.internet.wireless that needed to read your reply.

Yep. When in doubt, keep they mouth and keyboard quiet. I wish I could remember to follow my own advice, but I tend not to resist temptation.

In the future, if you want a reasonable answer to your problem, try to organize it as follows:

1. What problem are you trying to solve?
2. What do you have to work with?
3. What have you done so far and what happened? If you organize your question in some semblence of the above, methinks you'll get better answers.

Please note that I made no comments about satellite service. If I had, I would have sent you to the appropriate newsgroup, especially since you were asking for experienced users. I have limited lousy experience with Direcway and none with Wild Blue.

I couldn't find any other WISP providers in your area. I hate to ask, but some of the lookup engines now want your area code instead of zip code. Try here:

is listed, but there's no service. Argh. I'll try again later when the phone stops ringing.

Here's another one in your general area:

doesn't cover Vermontville but you might call them and ask if they have plans for your direction.

Lovely. I'll assume you don't want to play Solomon and arrange a truce. I've been involved in a few cooperative internet ventures, where the neighborhood dragged in a T1 and shared the bandwidth. A full T1 with 30 IP's is about $500/month. Critical size was 10 paying customers. Local distribution varies from wireless to SDSL over barbed wire.

Interestingly, two of these types of cooperative broadband cooperative ventures fell apart after they were publicized in the local news. It seems that the local cable and telco monopolies didn't appreciate the embarrassment and immediately announced plans to provide service. In one case, they actually delivered. In the other, it was just propoganda and nothing has happened.

Not really. In accodance to my arbitrary structure for posting intelligent questions, the main question is "How to get your broadband access in the middle of nowhere". If you're already decided that satellite is the answer to this problem, then please persue your questions in the appropriate satellite newsgroup, mailing list, or weblog. If you are open to alternative solutions involving wireless, stick around.

Idiot. I was hoping to avoid noise on a good group (sorry about misnaming the satellite group), by directing you to the right place (which I do read and where I would have been happy to help).

It turns out you'd already posted there - thus breaking one of the cardinal rules of usenet, not to post to multiple groups when you can cross-post. So, the only windbag here seems to be you.

Yeah, and if you'd actually _asked_ to compare wireless to satellite I'd have given you good advice on that, too. Don't go satellite if you can help it.

I'm really sorry you're such a jerk that you can't accept good advice when it's given, but there's really nothing I can do about that.

Actually you can. Start by not being so rude. Name calling is both childish and counterproductive.

Excuse me, but _I_ didn't start the rudeness. I gave the guy good advice about going to the right newsgroup, and he got insulting. It turned out he already knew the right ng, but decided to post here (separately) in defiance of common sense, netiquette and reason. OK, so I'm not good about accepting insults with grace, but don't you dare blame _me_ for starting this.

It doesn't matter who started it.