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 Review by Arion 
UPDATED: 315 days ago
member for 3.3 years, 1438 visits, last login: a few hours ago
 Marquette,Marquette,MI
 Contract price not specified.
 "Always on, no disconnects. Reasonable FAP. Great off peak speeds. It's been dependable for me."
 "Poor to non-existent customer service. Off shore csr's reading off of a script. Overloading of gateways and transponders."
 "For those of us in the boonies, especially when your stuck on dial up, it's the best way to go."
| Pre Sales information:
Install Co-ordination:
Connection reliability:
Tech Support:
Mail,DNS,News:
Value for money:
(ratings above consensus)
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First of all I purchased the system used off of Ebay and installed it and commissioned it myself!! Yes, it can be done. This is a DW6000 system and I got the modem, dish, mount, ect for $120 bucks. I have installed KU band dishes before and they are much more sensitive to aiming than a pizza pan dish. I followed the install manuals and was very careful on grounding and other requirements. My setup consistently provides performance which exceeds the plan specifications for a DW6000 with a home account.
Because of being a self install I have no experience with the sales people or installers. IMO the biggest problem with these systems are overloaded transponders and gateways. You can pretty much expect your great system speeds to be during off peak times. Mainly between 10pm to around 10am. However peak speeds is always better than dial up. My peak speeds are usually around 125kbps/35kpbs.
Many of the problems with the systems are do to very poor installs. The installers are taking shortcuts and not being careful enough. The best thing for you to do is to be proactive. Learn what the installer is expected to do and then be their for the install and let him know that you know how it's susposed to be done. If you have a good installer then chances are you will have a good experience. For example, if the installer fails to ground the system or grounds to an receptacle box instead of bonding back to the service entrance it will effect your speeds (especially upload) and reliability of service.
Also you need to understand what satellite internet is and what it is not. It is not anywhere close to cable modem speeds or performance. Bottom line__if you have been on dial up and your out in the boonies with telephone wire that Thomas Edison himself might have put up in the air, and if your proactive....you will probably be rather satisfied with the system. Boards such as these get a lot of people that are having problems so you might be tempted to think that the systems are all bad. That's not the case. Human nature what it is we tend to complain when things are not working the way we expect them but we seldom report when things are good. And yes!!, I would do it all over again. No question about it. 
Update 4/07
I took advantage of the "free" HN7000S upgrade for $25 shipping and handling. I got the modem in 3 days and got a power supply, lan cable and new base along with an install CD. You usually only get the modem with an update and use the same power supply ect. The upgrade went pretty smoothly except I never got an email from customer service which has a 28 digit ID that you have to put in to do the upgrade. A quick call to customer service fixed that.
With the new FAP policy in place that a lot of people are upset about I decided to upgrade to the pro package for an extra $10 a month. You get an extra 175 MB a day to play with and that should keep me from fapping. If you Fap now your on a 24 hour slowdown which would stink. I was pleasantly surprised that I was put on an 8-psk gateway. I didn't think IA-8 had any 8-psk capability so that was a plus. I ran a speed test at 12pm noon and was getting over 1mb in DL speed. That is quite an increase from the DW6000 and the residential package. So I am still overall pleased with the service.
Update 9/07
After having the new modem for 5 months I can say that overall I'm pretty pleased with everything. My speeds meet or exceed the plan speeds of 1000kbps on the download and about 170kbps on the upload. There is some degradation during peak times but rarely below 500kbps and that only lasts for a few hours or so. The new Fap policy that allows for unlimited downloads between 3am to 6am has gone a long way towards remediating the complaints that many have had about the fap policy. I think they have found the sweet spot in balancing service with network demands and I have no real complaints.
Update 6/08
The system continues to perform very well and as advertised. I'm still on the pro plan and get very close to my advertised 1000kbps down most of the day and evening. As a matter of fact quite often in running numerous testmy speed tests I get 1200 to 1300 kbps down. I do occasionally have some DNS issues where the system is unable to resolve a DNS address but this problem is spotty and not a real impediment.
Update 12/08
Upgraded to the proplus plan and so far so good. Customer service is using a more streamlined phone tree that put in me touch with a live person in about 3 minutes. This person sounded american based and we went through the procedure to upgrade to the next level of service. After re-running the registration routine the modem downloaded the new keys and files and I was back up. Performance immediately improved to the listed 1.5mb download speed and speeds have been consistent. The slowest peak time speed I've seen has been about 800 kbps. Being on G28 I have a 5 hour fap free window every night which has been welcome. Due to the new phone tree system I upgraded my tech support rating to a 3 from a 2.
Followup comments:  
FKKD
@direcpc.com
| Hughes Satellite 1. Of the B/B ISPs in area (aDSL:Frontier, Cable:RoadRunner, Satellite:DirecPC, Hughes) --
Hughes is the most expensive, though slight fluctuations with specials for DirecPC and Hughes.
2. Best (but limited) DL is 350 Kbs; this is NOT sustainable. Typical is 60-70 Kbps.
3. I am unable to utilize DSL or Cable as their delivery area falls 2-miles short of my residence!!!So I am locked into the $atellite trip.
4. Latency can destroy some connectivity (eg, I cannot access my business network because latency is too high)
5. I can surf and send eMails fine....
6. Except when the new profit-tool from Hughes kicks in: Called "Fair Access Policy", it is a mechanism to keep usage minimal (surf and email) by penalizing significant usage( download large files...100-300 Mb, DL video, etc). FAP means your BW automatically, without warning, gets cut to effectively 0 (they turn off your connectivity) for 24-hours.
7. This does not affect duffers and little old ladies who do not use the internet seriously, but just for program and patch downloads, this is serious constraint of business.... | |
| Shrle
join:2009-01-05
| FAP Problems We have 2 computers hooked up via a router. It's wired because that is the only way we knew to do it.
We surf. We do NOT watch movies, download movies or music and we are not gamers.
Being over limit on bandwidth is a chronic problem and nobody understands why. We have upgraded from the 400 to the 6000 to the 7000s and now have the 9000. I pay extra money for having the small business account in order to have more bandwidth. There is no business but this looked like a possible solution but here I sit with over limit FAP. We have been fighting this problem for years.
I have extra modems and was wondering if 2 modems can be hooked to the same dish and eliminate the need for a router. Having a network is of no benefit and I have long thought this might be the source of our problem although we live in a rural area. Having two computers working independently seems more secure and easier to monitor. We are just a couple of senior citizens who get our learnin' from AARP. It doesn't cover this but I'll bet someone knows the answer. We pay $70 a month and are on the verge of giving up this daily fight for an internet connection. Suggestions would be appreciated. | |
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SterlingJ85
Obama 2008
join:2000-11-19
Millville, NJ
 ·PHONE POWER
1 edit | Re: FAP Problems If you have cellular phone service where you are, contact the providers that you get signal with at your location.
Almost all cellular companies now offer data cards, and more rural providers are still offering service with no cap on bandwidth (larger carriers - Sprint, AT&T, Verizon all have a 5 GB monthly cap).. but service is also only $60 a month, so you could probably get 2 cards for each of your computers!  | |
| | | Shrle
join:2009-01-05
| Re: FAP Problems Sterling, I definitely want to talk to you but have to be away for a few hours. You couldn't possible write the answers to all of my questions so can you email me at
shrlelwry@yahoo.com
Your email may be here but I'm not sure what I am doing.
Thanks | |
| | | | Shrle
join:2009-01-05
| Re: FAP Problems I checked AT&T while I was out. It has a cap and is $60 a month per card with a 2 year contract.
I had no idea this service existed until you told me so now I have options to check. I have no idea what other carriers are available in this area of TX. | |
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