HughesNet Satellite → [HN7000S] Hughesnet Horizon 2 decommission

I am an RVer and many years ago I purchased a PortaSat by Maxwell Satellite - The dish & radio are on a special mount that sets on a tripod and my modem is an HN7000S -

I am currently assigned Horizon 2 (74W) which will be decommissioned October 30 - I called Hughesnet and they want to upgrade my system (dish, radio & modem) -

That won't work - I simply need to be reassigned to a different satellite -

What satellite would give decent coverage of all the US?

Any ideas how to get Hughesnet to just change my satellite assignment and leave my equipment alone -

Thanks,
Larry

You would probably get a better answer here.

These guys specialize in mobile satellite

»www.datastormusers.com/c ··· tebb.cgi

Essentially all of the Hughes satellites hit the 48 states. 113 and 117 are weak-to-nonexistent above the I-90 line in the west, but are the best for Mexico. Otherwise, 83, 89, 91, 99 and 127 are the most common in use by mobile users.

You may have to involve a dealer to make the satellite change. Montana satellite does it routinely for a fee.

Thank you both very much -

I will check datastorm and see if they have any ideas -

I'm beginning to think there's no reasonable option, except to change the satellite assignment -

The folks that sold Portasat were decent folks and there's a fair number of their units around - I see that Maxwell is now selling portable satellite TV equipment - I might luck out and catch one of them through my RV group - but I have a hunch they are going to say the same thing dbirdman suggested -

It's irksome to have to pay someone to change my satellite assignment, but if it's only a nominal charge, it will be a lot cheaper than messing with equipment - and I don't think I'll be able to get Hughesnet to change it - they are not 'portable user' friendly - I'll call Montana, if it's only $50, it might be the shortest distance between two points -

Thanks again - I don't see any need for further comment on this thread -

Larry

Yes, I know them well. Most of the old-time Hughes tripod dealers are out of the internet business, and the reason is that many of them pushed all of their actual Hughes business through a single Hughes dealer that went out of business. Thus they could no longer commission service, nor could they do anything about changing satellites, etc.

So, yes I think they will give you the same advice about getting a dealer to change the service, but they couldn't do it no matter whether they wanted to or not.

Most have been switching from HOR2 to G16 @ 99W or Horizon 1 @ 127 West. And by the way, if you use coupon code "dslreports" at check out, it saves you $10 on an account setup or satellite change through us anyway! Just food for thought!

Even more thanks -I talked to Montana Satellite -I'm clear on what has to happen - I appreciate the $10 discount - helps take the sting out of the bite -I can't thank y'all enough for the help -

Larry

Hi all,
Curious how the 74w decom is going for everyone. I called customer support 3 days ago, 1st 2 phone calls were a waste of time, all they could tell me is about a discount for repoint, $10 discount for 6 months or 12 months if I re-opt for additional year service on top of my existing 1 year left of current 2 yr agreement.
Next day called again, wow, got someone that instantly understood service is going out and we need to setup a repoint. Logged all the information, pushed it into system then oh no, it errors out. i will have to escalate this to another department.
We will contact you when its fixed.....
I think I've been just dropped into the Hughes twilightzone, been there before. It's like the movie groundhog day

Hi HVYMTL,

I admire your courage - I first approached HughesNet myself - it was going nowhere fast - the first problem I had was they wanted to send me to billing to change the service address - in as much as I wasn't going to be in one position for more than a week or so for the next couple months, I didn't think they could get a technician out in that time frame -

You maybe much smarter about satellite internet than I am - I have a clear concept and understanding of how it works, but I know nothing of the details - and the HughesNet system implementation for us tripod users is very vague - That's the value a dealer brings, they know how it works within HughesNet - The hardware is really the easy part -

I contacted a dealer and the satellite reassignment went smooth as silk - I was given a couple suggestions which 'bird' to pick - I was told to align, lock and pass a cross pol test on the satellite I wanted to be assigned to - that took a bit longer than anticipated - the first one I chose was too low on the horizon for the tree cover I was trying to aim though - I picked another that was 'higher' in the sky, aligned, locked and passed a cross pol test on that satellite - I left my system aimed on that 'bird', which meant my system was unusable - According to the dealer, I could have realigned with Horizon 2 if wanted to use my system in the intermin - apparently, when you align, lock and pass cross pol on a different satellite, HughesNet somehow knows that -

I placed and paid for the order to dealer and less than an hour later my system was running on the new satellite - the dealer called to let me know I was reassigned - I had to do another registration installer on the new satellite and instead of bailing at the passed cross pol test, I had complete that series - I 'tweaked' my alignment and I was up a running -

There was a very minor wrinkle - I still kept getting the decom reminder messages online from HughesNet, even though I was on a different satellite - I called HughesNet - the tech couldn't get it stopped - something about there was no order number - he was going to 'escalate' the case - I also called the dealer and left them a message about what was going on - a couple hours later the reminders stopped - not sure who to thank for that one -

I am not a wealthy man, in fact I'm a poor man playing in a rich man's tools - but I think it was $50 well spent -

If you need more info, please ask - I'm not an expert, but I'll do the best I can - and if I can't help, I'm sure one of the others in here can -

Good Luck!

No. You can run reg/installer on 50 different satellite/transponder combos in a row and your modem will always come back up on the assigned satellite - Hughes won't know or care. Only when you repoint to the assigned bird will the modem actually go online.

The reason that a dealer asks you to lock on the new bird first is that they want to make sure you can - you pointed out the problem yourself when you noted that your first choice was unworkable in your current location. You would not have been a happy camper if you had chosen that one, paid your money, then couldn't use it!

dbirdman - Please don't take offense - I really have little idea what I am talking about, but the dealer was very clear - they said, a cross pol test had to be passed on the satellite being requested and that "HughesNet" would not reassign to another satellite without proof of a prior passed cross pol test on that satellite -

During the interim if I had wanted to continue using my system, I could've pointed my dish back towards my assigned 'bird' until the reassignment had been processed - and the dealer said specifically that HughesNet would 'know' that I had cross pol'ed on the desired satellite -

The dealer may have been wrong, I honestly wouldn't know one way or the other -

I do know that the directions for my equipment include information on being able to cross pol on an unassigned satellite if the que is long on my assigned satellite - I've never done it before (until now) - It always bothered me a bit, because the skew may be different and would have to be readjusted after passing the cross pol which would sorta defeat the purpose of ensuring a proper alginment -

Anyway, I don't know who's wrong, all I really know is what the dealer told me - and I can say, the transfer went smoothly - a couple hours messing around with satellite alignments, $50, a phone call and an hour later I was operational on another sat - I had already spent that much time on the phone with HughesNet and still hadn't gotten to the point of changing my service address -

Sounds like $50 well spent -

Yeah, we hear that a lot, not just from dealers, but particularly from Motosat support (in the Datastorm world). Where possible (meaning they are still online with the old satellite) we advise users to tell support that they've passed crosspol on the new satellite, then after the short wait, run registration installer (without crosspol) on the satellite they were previously successfully pointed to. Works very well.

The decommission is a real pain. Hughes sent out a person from World tech services to repoint me and 2 days and 9 hrs. later I was put on SMP 6, I believe that is right but it is real slow so they are going to upgrade me to the 9000. I was on the 9000 when it first came out but the engineers finally admitted that there was a problem with the cell in Northern Nevada, so my question is, is anyone reading this from Northern Nevada on the 9000 & if so how is it working now?
Thank you