satellite internet,

[Bailey Guns]

so my phone has been out twice again today. more off than on since moving to the new house.

anyone here using a satellite connection for internet and/or phone.

would really like to tell qwest to go hump themselves.


we do not have access to cable at 8700 ft, so satellite is the only other option.

For the love of God, don't do it. Especially don't do WildBlue.

I had it for 5 or 6 years because, like you, I live in Bailey and it was either dialup, Wispertel (now SkyBeam) or satellite.

I used Wispertel for a few years and they totally sucked. Very fast, not very reliable and customer service was the worst I've ever seen.

So, I got WildBlue. Had it for years only because that was the only choice. Dialup would've been better and cheaper. I only thought Wispertel's customer service was the worst ever. Nope...it's definitely a title reserved for WildBlue. And keep in mind their "Fair Access Policy" will eventually bite you in the ass if you do much downloading at all. I'd rate reliability about a 3 on 10-scale. Upload speeds are glacially slow.

I now have Qwest DSL and I can tell you, even though it's Qwest, it's better than satellite.

To be fair, I've never used HughesNet but their FAP is even worse than Wildblue and it's more expensive. I've heard from people that have it that it totally sucks. Same issues as WildBlue. Horribly over-subscribed so bandwidth is ALWAYS an issue.

Just to be honest, I'm also a certified WildBlue installer and we (the install techs) go out of our way to talk people out of getting WildBlue if they have ANY other option for internet service.

You'll be sorry if you get satellite internet. At least in the form in which it exists now. WB is supposed to be launching another sat this fall to take some of the subscriber load off the current sat. We'll see if it helps.

Since you have Qwest you obviously have DSL. Call EvCoHS...they're a DSL company out of Evergreen (they lease lines from QWEST), everyone raves about their customer service and always gives them high marks.

ETA: Weather is almost never an issue with the sat service...especially just clouds. Lightning, maybe. But not clouds. Now you may have to knock snow off the dish once in a while but only if it really piles up.

[rockhound]

I have been hearing all the stories about satellite internet. honestly the service with qwest was much better at the old house.

this house has been a nightmare. i bet I have spent 15 hours on the phone with qwest in the last two months.

we had just a little piss ant storm roll through about two hours ago and my phones and internet went out again. THIRD TIME TODAY.

[Bailey Guns]

I have been hearing all the stories about satellite internet. honestly the service with qwest was much better at the old house.

this house has been a nightmare. i bet I have spent 15 hours on the phone with qwest in the last two months.

we had just a little piss ant storm roll through about two hours ago and my phones and internet went out again. THIRD TIME TODAY.

We had the same problem when we moved into our house about 10 years ago. I bitched and bitched because they kept telling me it was the wiring inside the house. I told them it was not the house wiring. They finally sent a tech out to test the house wiring and he said it wasn't the house. It was the wire coming into the house.

I kept bitching and they finally ran a brand new line from the house to wherever it goes. It took them 2 1/2 days but it's worked great ever since.

I have Qwest DSL and have a brief period at about 4:11 pm every day when I lose service for about 3 - 5 minutes. Weird.

[BlasterBob]

We have had Wildblue for a few years now and are pretty happy with it.
It does go belly up when there is a very heavy rain storm. When we get a heavy wet sticking snow, we do have to go out and clean off the dish. Other than that, we are satisfied.
Wildblue sure beats the hell out of the dial up (for us down here in the boon docks).