Thanks for the morning entertainment. That was fun reading!

Mr Bill, NEVER is a big word for you to be using so emphatically! You say you are not a rep speaking for Hughes! You must be on the stock holders board of directors the way you comment on other post!

Neither Bill nor I, nor anyone else who has posted in the last several hundred comments is an employee of Hughes. We are long-time knowledgeable customers, and as such I can tell you that both 1) and 2) that you list are BOTH completely false. Now, if you've been reading here more than a few days you should know why.

Don/Bill,
If you don't represent Hughes and you have no powers to get our complaints to the right people would you kindly MYOB? I now see at the top of my page there is a "Sara for Hughes (Official Rep)" and a "Patrick Fischer (employee)". My one and only question to them is if telephone companies are presently able to "carry over", why can't Hughes do the same for us? Thank you in advance.

Elaine, it has been clear for MONTHS that Sara and Patrick do not comment, or probably read, this topic anymore. If you want their attention you do so by starting a thread of your own. Be aware, though, that there is a clear, obvious to many/most, answer to your question. That is: The phone companies have almost unlimited capacity to serve phone call minutes. Rolling over is just an advertising decision that costs them nothing (although most phone companies stopped the practice a long time ago in favor of other promotions such as nights and weekends free, calling circles, etc.)

Hughes, on the other hand, (as is true of all satellite suppliers) has a very over-sold system. No concession of anything that results in more time/bytes to the customers can be offered without considering the impact it will have on other customers in terms of slowing the system further. There has already been an increase in "prime-time slowdown" complaints just from them rolling over one-day's worth of FAP. Rolling over more would simply make most customers less happy, while making a few customers happier. That makes it an easy decision not to do it.

A common response here is that Hughes should be doing everything, spending everything, in order to provide greater capacity. The answer to that, of course, is that they are! It takes about 5 years to get another satellite up there, and Hughes started the process about 5 years ago. All they are waiting on now is a launch slot. Since 1 of the 3 worldwide commercial launch sites is out of commission there is a huge backlog of satellites waiting to be launched. Best they can say is "sometime this year."

I would expect that they have already begun the process of getting the next satellite available for 5 years down the road when the new one won't be good enough. At hundreds of millions per, the resources to do multiples doesn't exist (and that's if you could obtain government and international approval for more slots in the sky, which is doubtful).

By "most others" you must mean everybody who doesn't understand the fine line between maximizing service for the majority and destroying service for everybody.

Don't forget, you have a choice. Dial-up is universally available.

First of all: No, Dial-up is NOT universally available. There are people who do not have phone lines available on their property. I know one of them - he's a customer at our campground and uses a cell phone.

Secondly: Dial-up is useless out here. The underground phone lines are a patchwork mess full of static. On a good day we could get 32 Kbps. A web page could take 10 minutes to load if it ever loaded at all.

The local phone company is horrible. I used to live out on the other side of town and everyone in the area had to get together and sue them to get halfway decent service. The phone lines would go out every time it rained, then we might have to wait a week before someone would come out and look at them.

The b*tch of it for us now is that our little 'community' is now connected directly to a fiber optic cable drop right up the road. We could all have DSL if the phone company would just put in a fiber optic to DSL converter. But since there's only a handful of people out here they won't do it.

As we often tell our customers: We'll get DSL when everyone else has fiber optic, and fiber optic when everyone else has 'whatever comes next'.

Hi Wadebear
Yep you have a poor phone company that see's no need to further it's small data base, called return on investment.

You should check the facts with fiber being spit to DSL, fiber requires a dedicated fiber line to your doorbell.

I agree with you and the answer is not Hughes, "they want all the money they can get, it is the greed that has griped the American market place." The more customers they sign up, the more cash they put in the bank, "BOTTOM LINE."
The U S Government has already approved and allotted money to install fiber optic cable throughout the United States including rural area's. The companies already have the money in the bank but only are installing the "high" populated area's. The rural area's will be the last to get fiber optics because of, "YOU ARE RIGHT, GREED!" We should get our elected Congress and Senate to hold these companies accountable!
Hughes is guilty of applying for and getting government grants to serve the rural area's. They will connect you free knowing they don't have the space for you to get a high speed connection in 2012's world. When you exceed your FAP, YOU ARE FRAPPED ON THE HAND LIKE A LITTLE KID WHO GOT CAUGHT WITH HIS HAND IN THE COOKIE JAR.
If Hughes can knock you down to slower than dial up automatically, Hughes can automatically notify you that you are reaching your allowance for today. I expect the big mouths of this blog will not agree, "but you will get over it." Hughes day is just around the corner and they will be the communication of the past as they are serving their customers at the present!

Bobby, not only does the local phone co-op around here have funds in place, but it is presently installing new fiber cable trunks RIGHT NOW (yay!) along some of our rural routes. The cable installation contractor is about 5 miles away TODAY and I'm hoping I'll get an opportunity to connect up later this year. My land-based telco is presently CenturyLink, but the co-op tells me their service will be available at my location. That means bundled broadband, phone & TV service with a LOCAL office where I can go see the people that run it on any business day. A rarity in communications these days.

I'm kinda excited about this.

Well now you're just trying to make the rest of us jealous.

We're kinda hoping that the neighboring property that was recently sold to a new owner will get re-purposed from farmland to a housing subdivision. That's about our only hope of getting DSL out here - enough people to justify it to the phone company.

Wadebear, I tried an X-DSL modem over copper pairs last year with CenturyLink, but never got reliable use. The max advertised speed to my service area was only 756k and the contractual legalese (as spoken by the agent over the phone) concerning available speed was w-a-a-y less than that. So, I've stuck it out with our favorite FAP provider so far. Then again, I 'spose X-DSL isn't much more than compressed dial-up during lightly loaded periods. Around here, CenturyLink is a legacy company that has served eastern NC rural areas with POTS for several decades. But in the present day, I think our population density around here doesn't fit their business model closely enough to warrant much investment in broadband for us.

Yes DSL is limited to that 756k, prove me wrong, impossible to be faster.
5 years ago I offered Verizon $5,000 to put in a simple repeater and refused.
DSL is limited to 5 miles without them.
The offer remains as I do have both HN and WB maintains my country life quite well

It would appear that this is a spammer, promoting a specific seller for Exede. The information is not incorrect, but everybody here who dislikes the nature of Hughes' broadband ads should think about what is being said here: "I have been told I should be able to stream movies without a problem."

Yes, the speeds are there, but the bandwidth isn't. About 3 or 4 movies and you are done for the month. Is that what you want?

Thanks for your input, Don. The representative from Via Sat did tell me I would be able to stream movies without a problem and said they would test the download from Netflix while here. I plan on asking them to test several movies before he leaves. They also stated you will not be charged if connection is not satisfactory. I have been told by Netflix personnel that I need at least 3 mps to stream a movie. So it is worth a try for me.

Also for me personally 3-4 movies a month would work perfectly. I would be ok with that because right now I am getting zero except through the mail.

I'm not sure that you understand that it is not the speed that is the issue. The new ViaSat service has great speed. The problem is that the basic plan has a 7.5GB monthly limit. At the speeds they are offering it is literally possible to use the entire month's worth in 1 hour and 20 minutes! Yes, you can probably download a few Netflix movies, particularly if they are standard def, but that will be it - you won't have an internet connection for the next 30 days! Their's works that way - you are shut down until your 30-day usage is below 80% of that 7.5GB.

They also count uploads and downloads agains the 7.5, and they do not have any free period during the day or not.

The WildBlue system has always appealed to part of the satellite-served population, but as a rule those that have chosen Hughes over WildBlue have done so because the maximum one-day penalty, plus uploads not counting, plus 5 hours free has been preferred by those people. As a result, many are willing to wait until Hughes has the same speeds later this year when their nearly-identical satellite comes online.

I got a card in the mail last month about Exceed satellite internet. I got all excited... Then I looked up the details and did some math:

No, there is not a daily bandwidth cap - there's a monthly one. Quoting their website FAQ:
----------
6. What happens if I exceed my monthly data allowance?
If you use up your data allowance before your monthly reset date, your service will be slowed. On a monthly basis your usage will be reset to zero, at which point your speeds will be restored. If you find that you need more data than your plan allows, you can always upgrade to a higher data plan. There is no charge to upgrade (or downgrade) your account between packages.
----------

"Your service will be slowed." It doesn't say how much. 33.6 Kbps like Hughes? Imagine dealing with that speed for several days.

Now for the math:

Our bandwidth usage for January was 13.58 GB. A light usage month for us.

So far of February our usage is already 11.52 GB, and the month is only half over. Mind you, most of that was just the last few days because I spent a couple of nights downloading 2 DVDs (new Linux based operating system called Commodore OS Vision - 7.53 GB) and went crazy on a streaming video site last night. But still.

When I got the card last month I checked on December's usage: Way more than January. More like 50 GB.

I've seen what the customers at our campground can do in just a couple of hours on the internet:

Guest1: "Hey, have you seen this Youtube video?"

Guest2: "What's that link?" (and views it on his laptop) "Hey, Guest3, have you seen this?" (who views it on HIS laptop and...)

Guest3 "That was cool. But have you seen THIS video?"

Repeat until we get FAPped.

I had to block direct access to Youtube with our router to prevent being FAPped every weekend.

A handful of people could use up the entire 25 GB allowance (at $129.99 per month) in the first weekend of the month, and then where would we be? Would we have to pay for an extra month to get another 25 GB?

And faster speeds would just mean using up the allowance faster.

And what about static IPs? They don't seem to offer them. It wouldn't be a major thing to lose ours, but it would be inconvenient.

Hi Wadebear
I have both HN and WB same plans $84+$84 = $168 monthly to compare, WB contract has expired so later will check into Exede as well as a cellular tower.
3 months remain with HN.

17GB for a month now has been lowered to 15GB but the speed is faster ?
Remember a monthly FAP will seriously hurt for a month unless they have a token system to make more of your money.

I have decisions to be made, walk in with your eye's wide open is my best advice.
Sure hope you didn't forget Valentines Day haha my mail lady was gifted chocolate

3-4 movies a month for $150. What a deal!
With HN I can download 3 movies in a night!

$149 is the initial installation fee. Monthly fee is $89.98, $4 more than what I pay for Hughes and the comparison is 1.5 MPS vs. 12 MPS. It would definitely be worth the $4 increase just for the speed factor alone. As for streaming movies I won't know until I get it on Friday. At least I am TRYING something new to see if it works. I personally don't like the token option. I want to be able to download a movie like a normal person. I am not saying I made the right decision here regarding streaming but for me it's worth a one time $149 shot. I will post in about a week after trying it out how it is working for me.

Yes, you can do the math. At full speed users will be able to use their whole month's allowance in 3.24 hours, assuming 17.5 GB.
This plan will never fly.

Interesting that your complimentary token does not roll over. Are you sure about that? I don't get, and can't purchase, tokens (second-class Hughes citizen), but it was my impression that those who do have them rolled over whether 7000 or 9000.

I believe that the only folks who are receiving roll-over tokens are the same folks who are receiving roll-over MB's.
I have been mistaken before but that was the impression I had gotten.

I'm sure that my complementary monthly tokens don't roll over. The 3 that I was gifted for auto-pay do and the bundle of pre-paid tokens that my folks got me for my birthday*** do, but not the monthlies.

*** Yes, it's sad. My parents actually bought me gift tokens because satellite internet is the only available form of outside communication at our backwoods cabin and they wanted to be sure we had enough bandwidth to use the VoIP and video teleconference helpline services from the hospital and emergency center in town if there was an emergency. Unlike other folks, I can't just get dial-up or cable or even mobile out here... it's satellite or nothing.

I can understand how someone might know that their tokens DO rollover if they've seen them do it, but I don't understand how anyone today, Feb 22nd, could know for sure that their tokens DO NOT rollover. Since the program has only existed for 22 days there just isn't enough data to know.

It's here http://community.myhughesnet.com/hugh...
Summarizing: all modems, starting Jan 31, applied on your billing date.

I don't know whether that applies to re-sellers customers too or just direct HN customers.

Wadebear,
They're already giving you something free that goes beyond your contract, and that not all users can get. I'm grateful for this, even though I only ever use a token to change my allowance reset time.

Considering the fees we pay for the service, regardless of whether we use 100% of our purchased bandwidth or not, the complimentary restore token isn't exactly "free". As for rollover bandwidth, the days of "use it or lose it" plans are over thanks to the cable, cellular and phone providers and the satellite companies will need to keep up if they don't want to keep losing customers to faster, cheaper and unrestricted providers/plans.

If they don't offer premium features for their premium prices, the only customers they will have left are poor schmucks like me who have absolutely no other option (no landlines, no cellular reception, no cable/FiOS)... and then they really will be losing money because there just aren't that many of us.

Apparently you don't realize that they NEVER had customers other than the poor schmucks like us! Ten years ago, it was estimated that 10 million people in this country had no other choice. Five years ago, it was estimated that 10 million people in this country had no other choice (haven't seen any new estimates). The thing is that the first 10 million is not identical to the second 10 million - as the rest of broadband builds out, people keep moving further out. There is still a lot of "further out" to go.

That leads to lots of "churn" which is the loss of customers and gaining of new ones, which is why it is so heavily advertised. Nothing along any of those lines is likely to change for many years to come. There is NO chance that satellite can really compete with land-based broadband no matter what they do. Currently, Exede (the successor to WildBlue) is telling people that they can compete with suburban DSL providers, because they can provide as much as 12Mbps speeds. The only problem is that they have to put extremely tight data caps along with those speeds. Hughes is telling their installers that they will provide 20Mbps down (with Jupiter), and their caps will be better, but they still will be tiny caps compared to cable. That's just how it is.

IEEE Spectrum Magazine posted an article about Exede last week. You see it at:

http://spectrum.ieee.org/telecom/inte...

The article isn't really judgemental. However, readers (engineers) comments on the article run pretty much along the same line as what Don has posted above.

I get the impression that you have skimmed my messages rather than looked at them as considered answers. I have no great love for Hughes, but much of what we talk about here is technical, and a large percentage of the rants are technically wrong, and usually the wrong technicality is used to bash Hughes. So, when I point out what is right and what is wrong, I'm seen as an employee, shill, or something else of the sort.

I have no idea whether your issues will be fixed, but so far it isn't looking good for you.

Well I have had over 25 case numbers so far and been refunded 6 out of 8 weeks.I have been on hold for over 12 hours.I guess if I don't get some kind of satisfaction my next call will to better business bureau I know nothing else to do.I have took good notes and recorded(even my cursing) each call.

I have heard of people getting some results after turning to the BBB with Hughes. I really don't understand why - if you know anything about the BBB you would know that all a company has to do to get a good rating is give them a lot of money. They do no research, and have no enforcement capacity. Most companies (but obviously not all) either pay up or ignore them.

Ignore the BBB. They have no "teeth" and they will not even attempt to help. The only thing they do is lower a business rating which can easily be cured by that business with money. If you are not happy with your service you should request a cancellation based upon Hughes inability to resolve your problem. You can also contact your States Attorney General if Hughes is making promises that they are unable to fulfill.
The BBB? Worthless!