Review by FightingBlue 
Posted: 1.1 years ago
member for 2.2 years, 150 visits, last login: 60 days ago
 Warsaw,Wyoming,NY
 Contract price not specified.
 "Better for some things than a modem."
 "Price, performance, reliability, download limits, customer service, quality of service..."
 "Worthless except for very limited circumstances and uses."
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(ratings match consensus)
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This review is probably something of an anomaly, since I'm not a new customer of Hughes. In fact, I've had it for well over five years, since it was originally DirecPC. I've dealt with it that long simply because there was nothing else available to me. It's been a very long, very difficult road. Their customer support is woefully lacking, as is their lower level tech support. You have to go through a script reader from India to get to someone who actually knows what they're doing. That wouldn't be so bad if it weren't for the fact that the service is pretty unreliable. It used to be that it would simply stop working for long periods, sometimes 12 hours at a stretch, with no explanation, warning, or apology. Standard proceedure for their tech support is that no matter what the actual problem is, they blame you and your computer. I'm a very advanced user, and aside from two equipment failures, every time that I've had a serious problem with the service I've proven it's on Hughes' end.
These outages have become less frequent in recent times, but the overall quality of the service when it does work has deteriorated. Speeds are slower, connections less stable, and they're trying to crowd more and more users onto the satellites in order to drive up profits. I couldn't describe all the tribulations I've had with this system, so I'll wrap with a word about the use of the system for downloading files, streaming media, etcetera: don't.
Simply put, don't even think about using this system for any kind of downloading, even light downloading. They now limit customers to under 200 MB per day, which is less than you could download with a dial-up modem. I'm sure that that sounds ample to some, but a lot of people are having to turn off automatic updates on their computer to make sure that they still have an internet connection when they need it. Small files, sure, but even a bit of casual YouTube surfing will put a significant dent in your allowance.
I will say this, if all you care about is a slightly faster web browsing or being able to download small files like office documents or sometimes a song, it's a decent service. But it's nowhere near real broadband like cable or DSL, and there are even other satellite services which seem more appealing. Personally, I've had enough, with the recent decrease in the download limit. I'm fighting my telephone company to try and get DSL out here, and if that doesn't happen, I'll probably end up getting service from WildBlue, whose download limits are 16 GB monthly.
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