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John and others,
I recently did an exhaustive evaluation of the broadband options available
in my area. At present I use BMI cable, but have large numbers of bad
packets. I found that I am too far from a telephone company office for DSL,
had a one-way cable modem installed (more below), investigated satellite
through DirecPC and Starband, and wireless service. After spending three
months on this I have settled on ISDN service from my local telephone
company.
The DSL Option
I found that I was too far from my telephone company's central office. It
seems that 15,000 feet from the office is the max. The phone company and
www.dslreports.com both verified that I was too far to get DSL.
The Satellite Option
I then got excited about satellite service. I spent time on the satellite
newsgroups for DirecPC (Hughes) and Starband and found that many users were
unhappy with their satellite service. It seems that if you download a lot
of data (most likely with a streaming data feed from an internet market
provider) that the satellite services cut back on the bandwidth you get.
The most general complaint from current users was that the cutback reduced
speed below 56K. That would not work for me. I also received the following
(edited) message from a fellow trader and who had Starband installed.
----------- edited message ---------------------
"Just an FYI for anyone who is interested in purchasing either a Radio Shack
High Speed Internet Satellite PC, or the Microsoft
Version, or the Dish 500 version. All these systems use what is called
Starband for their service. I recently purchased a unit to
see how it works from my home. Here is what I learned.
1) They state that their speeds are 500 kb Down and 150 kb Up. In reality
these numbers are like 100/20 (worse than a modem) most of
the time. You see...this service is like Cable Modems. The more people
online the worse the performance. At peak hours the system is
almost useless. The service is a startup and they have been trying to add
more bandwidth. Download times are improving but uploads
are still the pits.
2) Latency is HORRIBLE. If you are not an engineer, latency is the term used
to describe the "turn around" time that it takes to
send one item from your computer, to another, and receive a response. Ping
times on this system are typically 1.2 seconds! Physics
dictates that this will not get much better since your data needs to travel
an estimated 46,000 miles (round trip) just to get to a
T1 line for the internet. THEN you get all the normal hassles of the
internet to deal with. Hops are in the neighborhood of 30 just to get to
..... Data.
Starband uses a "proxy" server on your computer to help speed up web
surfing. This proxy comes in two parts. Part A lives on their
servers and actually does the browsing for you. Part B lives on your
computer and receives a highly optimized stream of data from
Part A to make the system appear faster than what it really is. This works
really well if all you are doing is surfing the web using
standard protocols for HTTP, FTP, GOPHER etc... I have tried setting .....
to use the Proxy server to see if it speeds up. When I
tried..the system would not log on.
So what does all this mean when put together? Well....for using ..... or
your real time datafeed this system is very inadequate.
The latency in the system almost ensures that each packet of data sent and
acknowledge by ..... is taking anywhere from 5-15 seconds to make the trip.
Because ..... uses many small packets to communicate with ........these
times add up to the point where the system just dies or timeouts. It is very
painfully slow right now to try and use your realtime software. Now if all
your doing is downloading ...this can be done in just a few minutes (way
better than a modem) if you wait until everyone goes to bed. :)
Why am I writing this? Because it costs $200 to setup, $400 for the hardware
and $70 a month! I would take this money and invest it
in Wireless DSL :) Starband is in so much trouble right now that they are
not charging for the service just yet (they keep rebating the customers back
the fees) and offering to extend their return policy for those who can't
wait for them to make it better.
------------- end of edited message --------------
The Wireless Option
I found that wireless was not offered in my area. The only wireless
provider had filed for bankruptcy, so that was not an option.
The Cable Modem Option
My local cable provider has one-way cable access. I had a cable modem
installed and attached it to an Ethernet card in my computer. I found that
downloads when first connecting were lightning fast. I got excited. Then I
found that if the connection was idle for a few minutes that I could not
ping the server for the cable provider. I lost connectivity. In order to
regain connectivity I would have to redial. Unreliable for using cable for
trading in my opinion. Since we do not have two-way cable I cannot comment
about that. It may be different.
The ISDN Option
My only remaining "broadband" option was ISDN service. ISDN service gives
me up to 128KB of bi-directional service to my home. It is provided by my
local telephone company (Verizon). It can be deployed anywhere, distance is
not a problem, and it is digital as opposed to analog service, connect times
are typically under 2 seconds, you are only billed for the actual time you
are sending or receiving data, you can hold the telephone company
accountable for poor service, you have a single provider so there can be no
finger pointing when you have a problem, and if you have a problem, you have
a reasonable chance of getting it fixed.
The technology is not state of the art, but has been around for at least 10
years.The negative is that it is a measured service. You pay by the hour.
In my case, the cost is $74.00 a month for 300 hours of A and B channel
service (128KB) and $1.00 per hour above 300 hours.
ISDN service costs vary by provider. I found that some companies have lower
costs than Verizon is charging me, while other cost more. So you would have
to check with you local company to determine your costs. But for me, at $74
it is about the same as Starband service if I don't go over 300 hours.
In my research I found that ISDN service seems to be more widely used in
Europe. It turns out that gamers in Europe use it for online realtime
games, so bi-directional response is good.
These are my findings. Your situation may be different. I wish you well in
the search for reliable broadband access.
Regards,
Ed
----- Original Message -----
From: "John Clayburg" <clayburg@xxxxxxxxxx>
To: "Omega List" <omega-list@xxxxxxxxxx>
Sent: Thursday, February 15, 2001 10:30 AM
Subject: Starband, DSL
| I too am in a situation with no cable or dsl possibilities.
|
| Anyone have any experience with satellite internet connections using e
| signal or other feeds?
|
| Starband looks like the best choice so far. However, the guy trying to
| sell it says there are days when it is very good and other days when it
| is quite substandard, possibly when they are working on the system.
|
| Regards,
| John F. Clayburg
|