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Turbocpe
Premium Member
join:2001-12-22
IA

Turbocpe to Jack_in_VA

Premium Member

to Jack_in_VA

Re: Millenicom Rate Increase

said by Jack_in_VA:

Go ahaead and cancel. That will just free up more bandwith for those of us who appreciate what good service by Millenicom has provided. After you cancel where are you going to get your internet connection? Verizon? Cap, ATT? Cap. Altel? Soon to have cap. Wildblue and Hughesnet? Big slowdowns due to high bandwidth users and high latency. Cox, Comcast, Time Warner all are or will be taking steps to curb the excessive demands on their systems. So just where are you all going that will serve your perceived needs for large chunks of bandwidth?

I think some people could be given a gold bar on a silver platter and they would still bitch.

[End of rant] Just fed up with people trashing the one good wireless ISP that is being forced to raise their rates. It is in no way Millenicoms fault so get off their case.
You replied to me, but I never stated I would cancel. I was passing on the word since it was not discussed. I also agree with the above poster that you need to relax a bit. Your post sounded as if you were taking it very personal.

I also agree with the above post that my service hasn't exactly lived up to expectations. When I contacted Millenicom, they informed me that my location would have a connectivity of "excellent" (their words) and with realistic speeds of "500K - 1.5M range (with upload speeds about half that)."

In short, my connectivity in this area (home, backyard, street, block, etc.) is roughly -90dBmV all the way up to -255dBmV where it goes into 1x mode. 500kbps download speed has never been achieved, and upload has never (if I recall) hit any high double-digit - likely due to the signal. On the odd days I've seen -87 dBmV (best, I believe), speed was roughly 200kbps / 24kbps.

I emailed Millenicom asking for advise, but they insist I call them. Sometime I may do just that. I also posted on this forum asking for advise as well. So it's not like I'm "bitching", I'm stating my experience just as others share their positive experience without being called cheerleaders.

That said, when I signed up with Millenicom, they did indicate that price for us existing customers would stay at the $49.99/month rate despite new customers would pay $59.99/month rate. Unfortunately, we found out that Millenicom could not keep that deal.

Please correct me if I'm wrong, but right now, lack of contract and the lack of 5GB cap is the really two outstanding differences Millenicom offers. Previously, price was one of those differences.

Because Millenicom stated they could not keep the 49.99/month deal due to their upstream provider, I think it's very reasonable to wonder if the 5GB cap may also be next, since it depends on their upstream provider as well and is probably even more out of their hands than their own pricing and earnings? No?

Jack_in_VA
Premium Member
join:2007-11-26
North, VA

1 edit

Jack_in_VA

Premium Member

said by Turbocpe:

said by Jack_in_VA:

Go ahaead and cancel. That will just free up more bandwith for those of us who appreciate what good service by Millenicom has provided. After you cancel where are you going to get your internet connection? Verizon? Cap, ATT? Cap. Altel? Soon to have cap. Wildblue and Hughesnet? Big slowdowns due to high bandwidth users and high latency. Cox, Comcast, Time Warner all are or will be taking steps to curb the excessive demands on their systems. So just where are you all going that will serve your perceived needs for large chunks of bandwidth?

I think some people could be given a gold bar on a silver platter and they would still bitch.

[End of rant] Just fed up with people trashing the one good wireless ISP that is being forced to raise their rates. It is in no way Millenicoms fault so get off their case.
You replied to me, but I never stated I would cancel. I was passing on the word since it was not discussed. I also agree with the above poster that you need to relax a bit. Your post sounded as if you were taking it very personal.

I also agree with the above post that my service hasn't exactly lived up to expectations. When I contacted Millenicom, they informed me that my location would have a connectivity of "excellent" (their words) and with realistic speeds of "500K - 1.5M range (with upload speeds about half that)."

In short, my connectivity in this area (home, backyard, street, block, etc.) is roughly -90dBmV all the way up to -255dBmV where it goes into 1x mode. 500kbps download speed has never been achieved, and upload has never (if I recall) hit any high double-digit - likely due to the signal. On the odd days I've seen -87 dBmV (best, I believe), speed was roughly 200kbps / 24kbps.

I emailed Millenicom asking for advise, but they insist I call them. Sometime I may do just that. I also posted on this forum asking for advise as well. So it's not like I'm "bitching", I'm stating my experience just as others share their positive experience without being called cheerleaders.

That said, when I signed up with Millenicom, they did indicate that price for us existing customers would stay at the $49.99/month rate despite new customers would pay $59.99/month rate. Unfortunately, we found out that Millenicom could not keep that deal.

Please correct me if I'm wrong, but right now, lack of contract and the lack of 5GB cap is the really two outstanding differences Millenicom offers. Previously, price was one of those differences.

Because Millenicom stated they could not keep the 49.99/month deal due to their upstream provider, I think it's very reasonable to wonder if the 5GB cap may also be next, since it depends on their upstream provider as well and is probably even more out of their hands than their own pricing and earnings? No?
I replied to your post in error and apologize. I was directing my comments to the others.

I had the same experience as you with Sprint and the Sierra 595U modem. Totally useless even when I drove to the tower with my wife's laptop. My disappointment was severe as I was on Hughesnet dealing with the severe slowdowns every evening and night because of the heavy users.

Jim_In_VA came over with his Franklin CDU-680 and it worked perfectly when attached to a USB extension cord. I was plugging into the USB on the desktop. I signed up with Millenicom, purchased a USB extension cord and the indoor booster amp from 3G. I have not touched it since. Sometimes my down speed drops to the 700 to 800 range when I'm sharing the tower but that is very infrequent. Same service (Sprint) different modem. Go figure.

I recognize a lot of screen names from the Hughesnet thread over the years and they use the same arguments as there. Apparently many defected from Wildblue and HN to Verizon and when Verizon capped them they moved to Sprint. Now that Sprint is capping the bitching continues. I'm just curious where the ones dropping the service are going for their internet.

Here's my speed today at 2pm.

Jack_in_VA

Jack_in_VA to Turbocpe

Premium Member

to Turbocpe
Turbocpe, here are my speeds from LA, Kansas City, Atlanta and Washington D.C. Even though my HA is Kansas City the latency increases over what it is for LA.

My tower only has one T1 so all I can get is around ~1200 down.









When I use the Sprint speed test site (dslreports) results are much different. Note latency.






dMarks
Melting Faces For Fun
Premium Member
join:2007-02-09
Jackson, MI

2 edits

dMarks to Turbocpe

Premium Member

to Turbocpe


Dunno what happened but yesterday I was only getting half that if lucky. That's the fastest I've ever seen on my connection. Must have quite a few people on my tower during the day apparently. That's in a rural fringe area using an antenna and only at -96 dBm

EDIT to add more results:








Guess that first one was a fluke perhaps, or just got a lucky second in to be the only one on the tower. These results are more typical of what I normally see, though sometimes will dip a little lower. These are Rev.A speeds. I can get my signal to tap into an Alltel tower for Rev.0 and get consistantly higher speeds (a little higher) but with worse latency.

All in all, to pay an extra $10 a month (I got in on the $49.99 price before the initial change) is fine by me. It's still much better than Hughes ever was. I need the lower latency anyways, but Millenicom beats Hughes in speed/latency/consistency hands down, so there's really no choice to be made by me.

Now, if they have to implement a 5GB cap...well we'll cross that bridge when we come to it. I still have a dial-up account on backup which connects excellent, so I can switch between the two when needed.
RegGuheert
join:2005-11-06
Berryville, VA

RegGuheert

Member

said by dMarks:

I need the lower latency anyways, but Millenicom beats Hughes in speed/latency/consistency hands down, so there's really no choice to be made by me.
I also need lower latency. Unfortunately Millenicom's EVDO Rev A latency is nearly twice that of HughesNet when something is downloading:

»EVDO Rev A latency higher than HughesNet during downloads

Unfortunately, my VPN falls apart due to latency whenever a download occurs over EVDO.

Have you EVER measured your ping times while simultaneously downloading something?

Reg
CMoore2004
Premium Member
join:2003-02-06
Jonesville, MI

1 edit

CMoore2004

Premium Member

Click for full size
Perhaps I should mention this is in an EVDO Rev 0 coverage area.
RegGuheert
join:2005-11-06
Berryville, VA

RegGuheert

Member

Thanks for the tests, guys. I'll conclude that this issue only occurs when speed is limited by the link quality rather than the backhaul to the tower. Still, it is the constant case for me with Millenicom. I guess the bottom line is that I'm too far from the towers. I had been hoping that Sprint would upgrade the closest tower, but that has not happened in the four months I've had the service.

Thanks again,

Reg

dMarks
Melting Faces For Fun
Premium Member
join:2007-02-09
Jackson, MI

dMarks

Premium Member

I can't remember, but are you using any type of antenna / amp for your setup?
dMarks

dMarks

Premium Member

Click for full size
Figure I should add a ping view while I download as well, just to give a perspective on what I get.
RegGuheert
join:2005-11-06
Berryville, VA

1 edit

RegGuheert to dMarks

Member

to dMarks
said by dMarks:

I can't remember, but are you using any type of antenna / amp for your setup?
Yes. Currently I'm using a magnetic dipole rooftop antenna with no ground plane and no amplifier placed in a particular position in a particular window to get -82 dBm at my modem.

I've tried my Wilson cellular Yagi antenna both with and without my Wilson cellular repeater. This improves my signal by about 10 dB, but I then pick up a particular rogue EVDO pilot that always knocks me straight down to 1xRTT where I stay forever. This pilot has been reported to Sprint level 4, but the technician that was supposed to follow up with me never did anything. I've discussed my tribulations extensively here:

»Millenicom Mobile Broadband NOT Replacing HughesNet

Before I cancel, I may try again with the Yagi to see if anything has been done to fix the rogue pilot. If so, I could be *much* happier with this service.

Thoughts?

Reg
RegGuheert

RegGuheert to dMarks

Member

to dMarks
said by dMarks:

Figure I should add a ping view while I download as well, just to give a perspective on what I get.
I see that your pings increase, as well, but they still do not get to the level of HughesNet. This is interesting, since your signal level is 17 dB lower than mine (-99 dBm vs. -82 dBm). (In other words, I have an EVDO signal power level that is 50 *times* the power level of yours.)

Besides the rogue pilot problem, I also have access to about 6 different towers (and *many* different pilots). These are about 8 miles away and closely spaced to one another, so it's hard to isolate any of them. I could try a grid antenna with higher gain than my Yagi, but I don't think I'll spend any more money on equipment until we find out if unlimited will remain. (A 5 GB limit would render all of these discussions moot, since that would be a firm deal breaker for me.)

Thoughts?

Reg

dMarks
Melting Faces For Fun
Premium Member
join:2007-02-09
Jackson, MI

dMarks

Premium Member

I sometimes have an issue with tower switching myself, but I use a wilson omni at the moment. I'm looking into getting a panel antenna for my setup

»www.cellantenna.com/Ante ··· yagi.htm

The CAY1912 with about 40' LMR400. May look into getting an amp, but I think with the panel pointed at just the one pilot that I get the best Rev.A from (there's a tower out here that apparently has more than 1 T1 going to it because I've done some more tests and have been close to 2000 kb/s a few times) I should be good to go, with hopefully a little better dBm and DRC.

As you said though, I'm gonna wait a month or two to see how things pan out with the Sprint 5GB cap and Millenicom. Really hope things stay the way they are at the moment.
RegGuheert
join:2005-11-06
Berryville, VA

RegGuheert

Member

said by RegGuheert:

Currently I'm using a magnetic dipole rooftop antenna with no ground plane and no amplifier placed in a particular position in a particular window to get -82 dBm at my modem.
Starting about June 27, I now have -76 dBm using the same modem in the same location. Speeds have gone from about 500 kbps to over 1 Mbps and pings are now around 190 msec idle and 350 msec during a download.

I'm thinking Sprint must have finally upgraded the local tower to EVDO Rev. A! I'll have to drive there when I have a chance to find out...

All of a sudden, the $10.00 increase is not sounding quite so bad. I'll certainly hold on to the service through July (and probably August) to see if this newly-improved service persists.

Reg