Dish Network for ISP?

[Nicholas Leippe]

I have a friend in Utah county looking at getting internet service via
reenabling a dish network account. The dish rep has told her that they
offer two options: 1) via satellite service, or 2) via their own dsl
service.

Previously, she had service through them and dish's internet service was
actually a bundled centurylink account--which she does not want.

Dish's reps refuse (or cannot) confirm what exactly they are offering and
she doesn't want to wait for the installer to show up to find out it's
something she doesn't want. Also, my understanding is that some satellite
services still use a modem/dsl for the uplink--is this still true?

Can anyone confirm what exactly dish has to offer now?

Her only other viable option would be Digis, but that could prove painful
given some logistic issues of her current home.

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[Levi Pearson]

Considering the logistics of bouncing IP traffic off of an orbiting
satellite, I can promise you it will not be a very pleasant
experience. Probably fine if you just need to download bulk data in
the background, but it will offer a terrible interactive experience
(compared to just about any non-broken terrestrial service), and it
will really only be usable interactively via some highly tweaked TCP
stack and application settings. RTTs *start* at a 1/4 of a second
here, and have you looked lately at the number of round-trips that
occur in a somewhat serialized fashion at the start of a web browsing
session?

I actually used an older generation of satellite internet, as it was
the *only* service we could get at the time. It required a dial-up
uplink, but I'm fairly sure that there are options now for satellite
uplink. DSL uplink would provide *better* service, though, as it
wouldn't incur the latency of bouncing data off an object in space. It
was just absolutely terrible, and although I could bulk download
faster than dial-up, doing anything interactive like ssh or web
browsing was excruciatingly painful.

There are some solutions to the problems inherent in satellite
internet (i.e. lots of low-orbiting satellites) but I don't think
there's currently anything in place, and it might be hard to convince
anyone who's suffered through previous satellite internet incarnations
that the new ones might actually work.

Post by Nicholas Leippe
I have a friend in Utah county looking at getting internet service via
reenabling a dish network account. The dish rep has told her that they
offer two options: 1) via satellite service, or 2) via their own dsl
service.
Previously, she had service through them and dish's internet service was
actually a bundled centurylink account--which she does not want.
Dish's reps refuse (or cannot) confirm what exactly they are offering and
she doesn't want to wait for the installer to show up to find out it's
something she doesn't want. Also, my understanding is that some satellite
services still use a modem/dsl for the uplink--is this still true?
Can anyone confirm what exactly dish has to offer now?
Her only other viable option would be Digis, but that could prove painful
given some logistic issues of her current home.
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[Nicholas Leippe]

That's what I've heard and would expect for satellite. I'm certainly not
recommending her go with a satellite solution. Her biggest question is what
are they really offering for DSL service--is it really their own or still a
bundled 3rd-party provider?

I suppose qwest DSL may also be an option.

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[John Shaver]

It's almost certainly 3rd party dsl, probably century link. Also, Qwest is
Century Link.

I've had Digis for a few months, and it's not terrible. It's slow at
times, but it's not Comcast.

-John

Post by Nicholas Leippe
That's what I've heard and would expect for satellite. I'm certainly not
recommending her go with a satellite solution. Her biggest question is what
are they really offering for DSL service--is it really their own or still a
bundled 3rd-party provider?
I suppose qwest DSL may also be an option.
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[Nicholas Leippe]

Post by John Shaver
It's almost certainly 3rd party dsl, probably century link. Also, Qwest is
Century Link.

It's the "almost certainly" part that I'm trying to become certain of.
I didn't know that qwest was century link. Good to know.

I've used Digis at my home for years, no major complaints. Their tech
support is actually quite knowledgeable and very helpful--they don't seem
too bent on sticking to a script and escalate quickly when you need
something above their ability or beyond their knowledge.

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