SatSig topic:

Earthlink Sat = Which Hughes Plan??

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Dec 25^th, 2006 at 5:53am

Maintaining my reputation for asking 'dumb' questions here on this forum, I ask:

Does anyone know which of the various Hughesnet service plans does the Earthlink-offered satellite service translate into?

I'm an Earthlink customer, and there is simply no getting that answer from their customer service department. Most of the reps are dumb as stumps, and I note that even if you find one with a glimmer of hope, satellite related questions are mostly guessed at rather than known. Most reps don't even know that Earthlink is really reselling Hughes service.

I would *assume* that Earthlink would purchase the cheapest possible service for their 'OEM' clients buying satellite service, but.....

....I note that I've never been FAP'd, even recently when I accidentally left a webcam site up for a couple of hours and ran over 150 meg an hour for nearly three hours.

That would lead me to believe either they were feeling very generous and forgiving due to my reasonable usage over the past few years, or I'm on some sort of mid-level plan.

Any ideas/experience?

Thanks....

Dec 25^th, 2006 at 2:17pm

Which indoor unit do you have: DW???? I suspect either a vintage gray dish or DW3000 (both one way) or DW4000 (two way), as Earthlink hasn't resold new Direcway/HughesNet services in years. They quit back in DW6000 days, while grandfathering existing satellite users. It's unlikely any of the tech support currently employed even worked there when Earthlink actively promoted satellite access. Webcams don't work too hot on one-way, so you're probably talking DW4000.

The reason the IDU type is important, is because there were only two plans before the DW4000; part time or full time. The DW4000 itself had - and to my knowledge still has - a FAP threshold of 169MB (225MB from 0200-0500) in four hour blocks. I question however, the accuracy of whatever is counting 150MB/hr from a streaming webcam. Could you perhaps be off by one decimal point; that is, 15MB/hour?
//greg//

Dec 25^th, 2006 at 5:11pm

Sorry for the lack of information.

Original service was contracted in 2003 from Earthlink; original equipment was a DW4000 series.

I upgraded to the DW6000 about 2 years ago; I'm on SatMex5. Dish is a white eliptical emblazoned 'Direcway'.

I have another antenna at our lake home, and run the modem back and forth for service there, with reranging. That dish is a .98 round one.

The data flow was measured on the FAP Mon program, and I'm very sure that estimate I provided is accurate; observing the flow after the incident was about 2 megs/minute; way faster than any webcam needs to be running. To make matters worse (and the reason I forgot about it running), it was just noise. When will I ever learn?

So, based on this, if you can give me an estimate of what you think my 'deal' is, I would be grateful.

Also, based on your recent comments, should I get ready to dump Earthlink, and contract direct with Hughes? I'm not unhappy at all with the performance of the system now.

Thanks, as usual! Merry Christmas!

Dec 25^th, 2006 at 6:05pm

Depends upon how you performed the "upgrade". Personally I don't consider DW4000>DW6000 as an upgrade. From an overall performance standpoint anyway. More like a giant step sideways. Was it a used DW6000 from eBay or some such arrangement? And to whom to do pay your monthly satellite connection fee?

If you're paying the basic $59.99 (not counting any possible Earthlink dialup charge), you've got the basic 169/225 FAP threshold. Either the FAPMon counted wrong, or they weren't paying attention at Hughes. Did you actually go to your usage page and verify the throughput count for that 3-4 hour period/

If you're considering moving on to Hughes, I'd also skip over the DW7000, go straight for the HN7000S. And if you've got the bux, buy the ODU upgrade also. Because if you're still technically an Earthlink satellite customer, you should qualify for the full $200 new customer discount.

//greg//

Dec 28^th, 2006 at 2:52am

Thanks for the info!