-=PCTechTalk=- Re: OT
- From: GMan <gman.pctt@xxxxxxxxx>
- To: <pctechtalk@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Sat, 5 Jan 2008 19:37:37 -0500
Sandi,
A one time fee for installation ($150 US, I think) and the equipment
remains their property. I supplied the router and everything past it. The
speed I get is not as advertised, even on the clearest of days. Bad weather
doesn't seem to overly affect it, even in a hard downpour, unless snow
builds up on the dish itself. At that point, I'm up on the roof (usually
during the snowstorm) sweeping off the snow (only use a broom so you don't
knock the dish out of alignment).
Pricing is based on a tiered structure according to speed. Babydoll and
I opted for the fastest speed and pay just over $80 US per month. The
middle tier is around $60 and the lowest one is either $40 or $50. Each
level of service allows a certain amount of upstream and downstream
bandwidth use over a rolling 30 day period. If you go over this amount,
they will knock your speed down to about twice the speed of dial up until
your 30 day usage drops below another threshold. In my case, the upper
limit for downloading is 17000MB and the lower threshold is 11000MB. For
uploading, it's 5000MB and I'm not aware of the lower amount. According to
their count, I have gone over my download limit 3 times since I became a
customer. I say "according to their count" because my own tracking of data
in & out of my network is much lower than that (about 1/4 of what they
claim). I have spent countless hours arguing with them and have yet to be
pleased with the results. It takes roughly 3 days for my tally to drop
1000MB, so that means I'm stuck at the much slower for a little more than
half a month before the speed jumps back up (to, as I mentioned, is
significantly less than what I'm paying for).
According to one of the main techs (who told me this "off the record"),
one of the problems with my particular connection is that my part of the
country connects to their server through a beam that comes out of Laredo.
While she didn't specify, I can only imagine she's referring to Laredo,
Texas. According to her, they have been having all sorts of trouble with
that base since it opened and they can't switch me over to a different beam
(I don't know satellite well enough to know if I'm being toyed with on that
one). Regardless, they send up 5 beams total and only one of them comes
from Laredo. So, if you look into DishNetwork, be sure to ask which base
will be supplying your connection. If it's Laredo, you may or may not
experience problems similar to what I'm dealing with.
Please understand that I'm NOT trying to talk you out of using
DishNetwork. As far as I can tell from all of my initial research, it's
bandwidth limits and its reputation for uptime are the highest of any that
are available around here. It definitely costs far too much, but it would
be more expensive for me to go elsewhere. If I ever choose to leave them
without a viable alternative (go back to dial-up), it would only happen due
to the problems I'm having with being hit with higher bandwidth totals than
what I'm actually using, but again, that's related to the Laredo issue.
If you end up with any specific questions about their service or the
contract, don't hesitate to give me a yell. :O)
Peace,
GMan
http://reddit.com
"The only dumb questions are the ones we fail to ask!"
----- Original Message -----
From: "Sandi Beach" <sandib2@xxxxxxxxx>
To: <pctechtalk@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Sent: Saturday, January 05, 2008 6:20 PM
Subject: -=PCTechTalk=- Re: OT
> Your post reminded me that I have been longing for more speed and have
> just
> about got my husband convinced that it would be o.k. We have a satellite
> dish with Dish Network. I am pretty sure I could get high speed with
> them.
> G, since you are using the satellite, do you often have problems with
> weather breaking up the signal? I think the guy who recently upgraded our
> equipment told me it would cost about $50. a month. Is that about right?
> And did you have to purchase any additional equipment?
> Sandi
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