Satellite internet

[dor]

I know someone in the Lake District that had it for a while. Cost was not an issue to him! Biggest problem was that the dish positioning seemed to be much more critical than for TV, and if it was very windy the flexing of the dish would be enough to lose signal. If alignment is very critical then I can see problems on a boat as any slight movement would deflect the dish.

 

He replaced it with a bespoke microwave link to a location in the town.

[Dave Payne]

Yes that was my worry, i dont think fixing it to the boat would be feasible so would have to have a pole in the ground, not sure the marina would allow this.

 

Looks like i am destined to not have decent internet access

[WotEver]

On the farm where our business is currently based they had a satellite dish for Internet attached to the house. They have since removed it because...

 

It was expensive.

It was unreliable in bad weather.

Probably most relevant - it was slower than a 4G dongle and much of the time slower than a 3G dongle.

 

Maybe it was just the system that the farmer had bought into and there are better ones around, I don't know as I didn't research it.

[cuthound]

As mentioned i cant get a signal on the 3 network, EE signal is very week, O2 signal is fine but they do not offer very good deals.

 

I would not be gaming due to the latency and would more than likely just be downloading updates and new games from Xbox marketplace, then streaming so i think satellite would work for me, i just need to know if anyone has it and do they have any problems.

Try giffgaff, they use the O2 network and are a bit cheaper. PAYG or recurring "goodybags" which is like a 1 month rolling contract.

[Guest]

Try giffgaff, they use the O2 network and are a bit cheaper. PAYG or recurring "goodybags" which is like a 1 month rolling contract.

 

.... and in my experience have the poorest coverage of the mobile providers.

[cuthound]

.... and in my experience have the poorest coverage of the mobile providers.

I agree regarding internet coverage, however their phone coverage is OK.

 

As the OP is in a marina with good O2 coverage, he should be OK with giffgaff. Certainly worth trying a £5 SIM.

[Dave Payne]

Yep using giff gaff at the minute, get decent 4g, only problem is the best they offer is £20/month for 6gb 4g, then you drop down onto 256kb during the day, i use 6gb no problem so the last week of the month i am usually throttled.

[Guest]

I agree regarding internet coverage, however their phone coverage is OK.

 

As the OP is in a marina with good O2 coverage, he should be OK with giffgaff. Certainly worth trying a £5 SIM.

 

Sorry but that is debatable too (when comparing to the others phone service)

 

When we are away in the 'van I carry my main (Smart)phone which is on EE. I keep a cheap dual SIM Nokia in the 'van as back up which has a PAYG GiffGaff (on O2) SIM and a PAYG Vodafone SIM in it. When comparing signals GiffGaff (On O2) often shows little or no signal when EE and Vodafone do. Totally unscientific I accept and just my experience of course.

 

EE seem consistently the best where we visit at least.

[cuthound]

Sorry but that is debatable too (when comparing to the others phone service)

 

When we are away in the 'van I carry my main (Smart)phone which is on EE. I keep a cheap dual SIM Nokia in the 'van as back up which has a PAYG GiffGaff (on O2) SIM and a PAYG Vodafone SIM in it. When comparing signals GiffGaff (On O2) often shows little or no signal when EE and Vodafone do. Totally unscientific I accept and just my experience of course.

 

EE seem consistently the best where we visit at least.

I agree that no one network covers everywhere. The only answer is mulitple SIM cards on different networks.

 

I thought the current government said they were going to force all networks to share base stations and masts, when they came into power in 2010. About time they pulled their collective finger out and forced them. Then nearly everyone will get a decent signal wherever they are.

[Dave Payne]

This is a good site for finding out where the masts are for your area, plus it tells you which mast for each network.

 

http://www.sitefinder.ofcom.org.uk/search

 

So when i search my marina, it shows a mast for O2 nice and close, then 3 EE and vodafone all a little further away, but i guess because something is blocking the signal (trees, houses or even the TNT warehouse) i am never going to be any good on anything than O2/Giff Gaff.

 

Looks like i will have to buy more £20 bundles per month.

[Justme]

As mentioned i cant get a signal on the 3 network, EE signal is very week, O2 signal is fine but they do not offer very good deals.

 

I would not be gaming due to the latency and would more than likely just be downloading updates and new games from Xbox marketplace, then streaming so i think satellite would work for me, i just need to know if anyone has it and do they have any problems.

 

 

What equipment are you using to get the weak EE signal?

 

When our EE sim is in the router or 3g usb dongle it gets 1-4mb.

 

Put it in the 4g mifi with twin cable antenna & it gets up to 50mb from the same exact spot.

[ditchcrawler]

This is a good site for finding out where the masts are for your area, plus it tells you which mast for each network.

 

http://www.sitefinder.ofcom.org.uk/search

 

So when i search my marina, it shows a mast for O2 nice and close, then 3 EE and vodafone all a little further away, but i guess because something is blocking the signal (trees, houses or even the TNT warehouse) i am never going to be any good on anything than O2/Giff Gaff.

 

Looks like i will have to buy more £20 bundles per month.

Do you have an external aerial or are you relying on a dongle inside your boat?

[Dave Payne]

Using a spare phone, lumia 630, i actually thought about it last night and worked out if i put the phone on one of those sucker pad car holder things, in the rear window on the side that faces the antenna, i get two/three bars on the phone, its H+signal also as the phone is not 4G so its the best signal i am going to get by the looks of it with that phone.

 

Only issue now is that i watch netflix on the ipad in the bedroom at the front of the boat so it buffers slightly every ten minutes or so.

 

I think what i might do is try my daily phone with the EE sim card in, this phone is 4G so in the same spot i might get a better signal.

 

Its all a bit of a faff really.

[Richard10002]

Are you 100% sure about that? There use to be older systems that did exactly as I describe. Push to the sat bb provider via phone receive via. The dish.

 

Just google 1 way satellite broadband.

 

+1

[Richard10002]

Using a spare phone, lumia 630, i actually thought about it last night and worked out if i put the phone on one of those sucker pad car holder things, in the rear window on the side that faces the antenna, i get two/three bars on the phone, its H+signal also as the phone is not 4G so its the best signal i am going to get by the looks of it with that phone.

 

Only issue now is that i watch netflix on the ipad in the bedroom at the front of the boat so it buffers slightly every ten minutes or so.

 

I think what i might do is try my daily phone with the EE sim card in, this phone is 4G so in the same spot i might get a better signal.

 

Its all a bit of a faff really.

 

It's only a faff until you find the solution.

 

I have an EE data sim in a Huawei Mifi with a Solwise provided aerial. In Dunham Massey earlier this year the mifi without the aerial attached got no signal on Three and an intermittent G signal on EE - pretty much unusable. Plugged in the aerial and got several bars on both Three and EE. If putting your phone in the window improves things a bit, and aerial on a mifi should do the trick - that's exactly how it went for me.

 

In one thread you seem to be needing a large amount of data, but in another you run out of 6Gb data after 3 weeks, which suggests you probably use 8Gb per month, (I may have Misunderstood this??)

 

I've just signed up to an EE deal at £27.50 per month for 24 months for 50Gb per month - it's a half price deal, so could end at any time. If I need more from time to time, I'll get the 100Gb per month sims offered by EE at low cost like some others here.

 

I think Loddon has managed over a year of free/low cost 100Gb per month data this way, although it involves having a few email addresses, and a couple of addresses for delivery... as well as hoping that another offer is just around the corner.

 

So your next "faff" is to get the right Huawei Mifi device with one or two aerial connections, a decent aerial, (some succeed with the cheap ebay jobs. mine was about £80 from Solwise), and pop your EE sim in. Lots of threads on this kind of stuff - Id guess a search for Huawei would produce sufficient info.

 

Being on a boat with modern technology is a bit of a learning curve - you can call it a faff if you like I've been "faffing" with on board internet since 2006, including offshore from UK to Malta and back

[Jess--]

you may find that you get far better results using something that is 4g capable.

 

in one location I experimented with my phone and found that if I shut down the 4g option and made it stick to 3g/2g only then I got a rubbish signal (1 bar) and barely any data at all, switching 4g back on took the signal to full scale (5 bars) and consistently tested the connection at 50mb download and 30mb upload. my assumption is that in that location the nearest tower for my network (three) was 4g only

[Dave Payne]

Ok, been browsing the web.

 

Carphone warehouse are doing this deal

 

http://www.carphonewarehouse.com/broadband/mobile-broadband/buy/huawei-4g-mifi-di103-idcon

 

Its there own network iD, which uses the 3 network, now i know when i had a three phone before i couldnt get a decent signal aprt from this same window, but i fi was to buy the below and stick it on a pole at the rear of the boat i reckon i could get a decent signal.

 

http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B00L57AL10/ref=ask_ql_qh_dp_hza

 

Or i buy an unlocked Huawei and have a few different sims on the go picking up the deals when they come around!

In terms of usage, i use my 6gb in three weeks just doing the social media thing on my phone, i would like to stream also so 20gb could be ok, worse case i have to top up twice in a month and pay £40 which i can accept.

[Richard10002]

Does the carphone warehouse mifi have aerial connections? is it unlocked?

[Dave Payne]

I do not know if its unlocked.

 

I google imaged the router and believe it to be a E5573 that has the ports to connect the antenna linked.

[Dave Payne]

If not unlocked you can pick them up cheap enough.

 

 

http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/offer-listing/B00U7POBOE/ref=dp_olp_0?ie=UTF8&condition=all

[dor]

you may find that you get far better results using something that is 4g capable.

 

in one location I experimented with my phone and found that if I shut down the 4g option and made it stick to 3g/2g only then I got a rubbish signal (1 bar) and barely any data at all, switching 4g back on took the signal to full scale (5 bars) and consistently tested the connection at 50mb download and 30mb upload. my assumption is that in that location the nearest tower for my network (three) was 4g only

 

I quite often found that i might get barely any signal on the phone (Vodafone) yet can get a fast 4G data connection. Quite happily downloads at, say, 10 Mbps but phone will just drop out, even with 4G showing on the data indicator. I think that there is some mast-sharing on the 4G network where the phone network isn't shared (Was it part of the deal when the 4G bands were released?).

Edited January 7, 2016 by dor

[bigste]

There is some confusing info on here so I thought I'd chip in as I used to have satellite internet.

Firstly, once of a day it was only one way stuff so you needed another connection. That's long gone and now it works both ways. They speed these days is superfast and that is what the price is based on. The faster it goes the more you pay. There is a fault with the system but depending what you use it for it may not affect you. Although it is super fast to download or upload you cannot use it for holding a live conversation as it has a delay of close on a second. That means a voip phone would be useless as would skype although if both parties were on the ball they may be able to put up with the delay.

All in all if you were happy with a speed of maybe 5mbps they price per month would be reasonable. Installation would be the problem unless you planned on leaving it up. Price of the equipment has come down and I would guess it's well under £200 these days.

[Dave Payne]

Well over £200 if you dont want to spread the costs over the term of the contract....

[bigste]

I've seen it for £149, There are lots of places fighting for the business.