HughesNet Satellite → Re: Datacaps are a scam. Does nothing for congestion.

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.