| reply to TexasRebel
Re: Datacaps are a scam. Does nothing for congestion. Caps only serve a purpose if they stop people from doing intensive activities, specifically during peak time. If you raise a cap too high, you might as well not have a cap at all. Because once your users have enough capacity to stream Netflix, torrent movies, download large games, they are almost certainly going to do so during peak because that is when it is most convenient to them and the cap becomes worthless. Peak is the only time that matters. For this reason, I would argue that all landline service caps are useless from a congestion countering perspective. Their caps are high enough that they don't limit people during peak.
Wireless based services are another story. The caps on the new satellites are too low. I think there is only one person on this board who would argue against that. But I would argue that they do exactly what they are supposed to do. They are so low that most users won't stream Netflix at all, and they will do most of their downloads when it is less convenient or off peak, particularly the night where they have extra usage. This lowers congestion during peak. The question becomes whether or not it is necessary to do this. It doesn't take many people to fill one of these satellites. In fact less than 10,000 people maxing their connections can completely fill one of these new satellites and significantly less for the older satellites providing Exede 5. These satellites simply do not have enough capacity to deliver high bandwidth services to hundreds of thousands of people. I do see why they have them where they are. The caps are not so much about ripping people off as they are simply being a business decision made to try to maximize network performance. They do the job, but they should be bumped up a bit to keep up with the growing demand. They are last generation caps in a next generation world.
Verizon does the same thing on their wireless network. Their CEO said he doesn't want people to be watching Netflix on his 4G network. That's why the caps on HomeFusion are so low. You can do most of your daily tasks, but you can't do the high-bandwidth, network-congesting ones. It is not to rip people off, it is to protect the network. |
|
| Just so you know, it isn't the users crippling the Gen4 and Exede12 satellites... It is the ground stations... These satellites can in theory handle ~2 MILLION people at peak hours. They just can't get a large enough pipe to handle what the satellite can handle currently. |
|
| said by C0RR0SIVE88 :Just so you know, it isn't the users crippling the Gen4 and Exede12 satellites... It is the ground stations... These satellites can in theory handle ~2 MILLION people at peak hours. They just can't get a large enough pipe to handle what the satellite can handle currently.
Those high numbers were estimates that were made because the caps are in place. If they were not in place, the estimates made would be substantially less. To the point that the satellites would never pay themselves off.
A single pair of fiber using Dense Wavelength Division Multiplexing (DWDM) used in network cores can move terabits. Viasat-1 can only move a theoretical 134Gbps and Echostar XVII slightly less. That is massive for satellites, but in reality tiny when you offer 10Mbps+/1Mbps+ to a multitude of subscribers.
Backhaul capacity is relatively easy to purchase. When you buy bandwidth from a Tier 1 or Tier 2 at scale, they will provide. In fact I am not sure if that is truly Hughes' problem. It could be a problem inside the gateways, not the backhaul. It almost has to be an internal network issue. As I have said before, I have seen small nonprofit rural cooperatives with more backhaul capacity than Viasat-1 and Echostar XVII combined. |
|
|
|
| You do know the majority of people rarely ever cause a connection to hit 10Mbps for very long, right? Maybe 2-3 seconds. That is why in theory the system can handle so many people at a time. There are other reasons coming in the near future that I currently can't explain.
And it could also possibly be the gateways are overloaded, but, from my limited knowledge, the maintenance they did the other night for the beams listed on their forum was for gateway work (Think they was upgrading it for my beam....) more than anything. I still have yet to see corrected speeds. |
|
