Can someone please explain this to me?

[waterworldly]

THanks for the info Viking . . .

[FrankZ]

Originally Posted by David M

Hah...that's funny because I installed and aimed my own DirecTV dish! The hardest part was getting the dish itself. Nobody wanted to sell one to the end user. I had to lie to get them to sell me one. I aimed it using a baby monitor of all things...listening for the different pitched tones coming out of the TV until it was spot on.

Which dish. We have the 5 LNB SlimLine dish and I had an issue getting some channels after the install (the new HD channels) When they came out to fix the issue it turns out the set screw for the LNBs was too tight and had torqued the frame ever so slightly out of whack. The latest dishes are very touchy to alignment.

[maginy]

Hi, Guys.

New member here - first time posting. I googled the phrase "boat satellite internet" or some such, and found your forum.

I'm taking my family on a sailing charter cruise for 8 days in Tahiti in February '09. I'm starting to research satellite internet connectivity, because it's critical for me to be able to go online while on the boat, and do FTP, email, browse web pages, etc.

I found a company today that rents a product called Nera Worldpro 1000. I called them and they swear that by using their product I will have full online access on the boat, as long as the boat is basically stable in the water (minor rocking while anchored is okay, they said; the boat just can't be cutting through the water.)

Does that sound plausible to you? Has anyone here used this product? And what about remote Tahiti? Any suggestions will be greatly appreciated. Thank you!

Best regards,
maginy

[drew.ward]

One option to check out is xmradio and Sirius. They both have marine options and claim you can get service up to 100 miles out from US waters. I would imagine its better than this because when living in Mexico I could use my XM radio all the way down in Veracruz and that's below the tropic of Cancer!

It only uses a tiny antenna and doesn't matter how you're moving.

I have heard rumors that they offer some sort of limited internet access, but nothing is on their sites. They do however have marine weather and other info packs as well as limited tv and other such. I would imagine someone is offering some sort of basic emal and web through them, might be worth checking out just for the much much simpler set up and lower cost.

[hellosailor]

David, DirectTV is easier to align than a two-way satellite dish. The footprint from the TV broadcasting satellite coming down may be a thousand miles wide, so your aim can be a little off and you'll still get decent signal. But for two-way connections, if you are not spot-on with pointing back to the satellite, it will receive a much weaker signal FROM you, which can lead to one-way packet losses and higher retry rates that you might not notice. But they will degrade the system speed for everyone, yourself included.
There's some clever software on the web that asks which satellite you need to line up, and then generates a calender for 6(?) months showing when that satellite will be directly between you and the sun, or moon, etc., so that for a few minutes you've got a chance to line it up directly--optically!
Other than that, azimuth and elevation, same as sextant skills, are all that's really needed. Or best of all, something that will display your connection quality in db so that you can push for every last one. Pro installers usually have a "box" that sits outside with them and shows the numbers, a bit pricey for one-shot home use though. "Rocket Science versus The Cable Guy" ? [g]

[Maren]

Originally Posted by hellosailor

DirectTV is easier to align than a two-way satellite dish. The footprint from the TV broadcasting satellite coming down may be a thousand miles wide, so your aim can be a little off and you'll still get decent signal.

Exactly! TV is a broadcast signal whereas internet isn't really.

DavidM: That's a really clever idea with the baby monitor. It’s much easier than lugging around a small TV, less frustrating that having a person say yes or no, and comparable with the tuner software you can get.

Maginy: I don’t really know. I can say that I’m not all that good at aiming TV dishes which are much easier than internet. I know a guy who can usually get a TV satellite in a couple minutes with just the dish, some hand tools and a TV. My fastest was 15 minutes and usually the process takes a lot longer. In fact I think it really only starts to work well when I starting talking dirty to the gear. Maybe it likes it I don’t know. But I do know satellite internet is much more difficult to aim. The sat dish systems I’ve used overseas are not only way too big for a boat, but are pretty much permanent. Aiming frequently takes hours. Maybe the Nera Worldpro 1000 system works like a charm but I would put the burden of proof on the company before I drop the cash.