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DirecWay Satellite Configurations and LAN Configurations?
Need for Speed asks: "I just moved to the boonies and I'm looking into DirecWay from Hughes. I'm too far from my CO for ADSL and IDSL is too expensive. DirecWay requires their modem to be connected to the USB port and their software to be installed on the client. Multiple connections can be supported by enabling ICS (Internet Connection Sharing) in Windows on that client. I then can connect a router/etc to the ethernet card on that client. I don't want to sacrifice my Linux box to do this. A direct connection from the DirecWay modem to my Wi-Fi router would be nice, but it doesn't seem to be an option here. Has anyone successfully configured DirecWay without installing the DirecWay software and connecting the DirecWay modem directly to your computer?"
You're kidding me? DirecWay requires using a usb connection and *software*? Whatever happened to the days of running ethernet out of the back of these routers? I've seen a few comcast cable modems only set up for usb, and that's just nuts. Now this - I'm absolutely baffled that they would do this. I know someone getting this installed on Friday - so I am very interested in finding out ways to make this work with other operating systems or directly with a wireless router.
Go without DirectWay for a couple of months, and pick up a cheap machine specifically for use as the windows box. Not perfect, but easy and effective.
Nerd rage is the funniest rage.
1.) Have you called them and asked them if it's possible to use their service without their software? (DON'T use that awful Frequently Asked Questions link on their homepage... it's one of those question bots). I don't know how different satellite service is, but Time Warner swore that I had to use their Windows software, and I have yet to install it after two years of service...
2.) I know this sounds ridiculous, but maybe you could get the software to work in wine?
3.) This isn't a question, but try logging into the modem from linux (one forum I came across suggested that 198.196.1.1 un:(your ISP user name) pw:admin works) and assigning your IP/DNS/gateway/everything to resolv.conf etc. off the modem settings. Who knows, might work.
Here.
Next time, google.
I remember reading an article about a year ago where-in the USB based ethernet/modem for a sat system as actually an ETHERNET device, with a USB to Ethernet adapter built in.
pop the cover and have a look...if you don't mind voiding the warranty.
From the readme:
2-Way/DirecWay
I only have the 1-way service (In Australia, Bigpond charge rediculous
amounts for 2-way ($450/month as opposed to $80/month for 1-way)
The code is in place as a best guess for a 2-way service,
but there are a few things that must be done before it can work.
These include Tune the transmitter, add packet headers to the
packet before sending to the satmodem, and set dpc->flags |= DPC_2WAY
Again let me know if you implement this and I will link to / include your work.
There have been a few slashdot articles about satelite internet access, mainly starband, which people are running Windows in a VM so they can use it from a linux machine. Although it appears one has to do some tuning with linux even if windows is sharing the connection.
the good ground has been paved over by suicidal maniacs
slightly off topic - a comment not on linux, routers, ethernet, and the Hughes USB connection, but on the Hughes service itself.
i hope your understand the infamous FAP (Fair Access Policy). i never ordered DirecWay or DirecPC when I was totally rural because you basically pay for speed you can't use, unless you are just a light internet user. forget p2p unless you use a client that lets you limit dl speed. forget heavy downloading. i believe in its current implementation, the limits are that if you have the normal home user package and download more than a given amount, possibly 157 MB in 4 hours, not sure, you will be 'FAPPED' for the next 4-8 hours, which means the NOC slows the xfer speed to your ip to slower than modem speed for that period of time. you can upgrade to the 'business service' which last time i checked allowed around 500 MB in the same period of time before one was FAPPED, and which was around 99/month several months ago. i believe you can go to 3rd party resale reps and possibly get higher xfer packages than those above for more $ a month, but their pricing was outrageous by city standards. afaik, there is no 'unlimited dl' package.
people who've had the service have told me that getting FAPPED is capricious and unpredictable.
i believe that the competing satellite data service from the DISH network has similar restrictions (not sure) and last time i checked it was in bankruptcy.
alternatives:
if you connect thru a large telco, you can prob get ISDN, which can be expensive (SBC wants almost $100 a month and that doesn't include ISP charges) but at least the bandwidth is yours. some small telcos have it. many don't, and have no announced plans either for isdn or dsl any time between now and forever.
ATT offers synchronous DSL to a number of addresses that don't qualify for ADSL. their prices as of last fall were high, 100-150/month, for ISDN-like speeds. i don't have the right phone number for that service, would go to the web site and search.
some neighbors can band together for a local loop (likely very expensive and many rural telcos dont have a clue) (know some people who investigated this in rural north tx and gave up for the time being)
you can start a business providing fixed satellite service to your local town, if you live near enuf to a small but decent population center, and then try to setup the tower so that you're in range. no idea on feasability, know some rural areas in n texas that have this - have heard that in some towns the city govt paid for it and went into the ISP business, cannot confirm. a new one in my area is aledobroadband.com. know nothing of the business model.
if you live withing driving distance of a decent town with either cable or dsl, you can pay all or part of someone's dsl or cable, or rent/borrow a location and setup your own cable/dsl, and then move data via a portable hard drive.
when i first went rural there was no ISDN and i bonded modems and paid for part of my townie friend's cable modem. after ISDN became available in my location, i upgraded, but kept access to the cable connection.
some light surfers love the Hughes service. many think it's a rip. every time i investigated and asked around, i just heard such bad reports of both the ISP quality and customer service that i never went with it.
best of luck, and would love to hear what other rural people have done to get anything resembling broadband.
I am an FCC certified direcway installer and I think it's a piece of shit. I was totally offended when I was told that it would slow down a VPN connection b/c they block ports. I was not happy when they told me that it only ran on Windows 98SE or newer (the reason for this being the software helps monitor the signal, blah blah), the latentcy is 500ms-700ms, and that it was the speed would come to crawl if you setup a LAN behind it.
I have also used this service, we used it to setup and internet connection in the middle of a forest, lets see ya get anything other than a satelitte connection in the middle of a forest ;)
The poster above is spot on with the description of the twin box unit etc. However there are a couple of points you need to consider. Firstly the software on your windows machine is used to download the correct keys to allow your connection to work. Once this has been setup they are stored in the satelite interface boxes, but you will need windows at least once for the setup / install.
Also, yeah the USB interface is not great, but there do exist satelite boxes for DirectWay that just provided an ethernet out - just expect to pay a LOT more for it. However ICS will work, as will other win32 Nat solutions. We used ICS with a separate linux webcache and caching DNS server. We ran a large number of PC's from this system with no real problems - however you will find the delay on dynamic pages - such as slashdot or web based mail client, is horrible. The speed is great, but the latency sucks :)
If you ever drop your keys into a river of molten lava, let'em go, because, man, they're gone.
... So now I can download that huge pr0n MPEG, and then be automatically fapped for 8 hours? Where do I sign up? =D
The transmitter and receiver (model# ITU-R1 and IRU-T3, respectively) actually have the DirecPC logo on the front and either the word "transmitter" or "receiver." Both of these have an antenna connector and a data connector (DB-25 or so). In addition the transmitter has a USB port and an AT-keyboard-connector-looking power input. The third box (model# DW4-G1) is labeled "gateway" and has the DirecWay logo. The back has a USB port that is connected to the transmitter, a similar power input that is piggy-backed from the transmitter (looks kludgey), and four ethernet ports.
Functionally, this third box seems like those "cable/DSL routers" except you connect to the outside via USB instead of regular ethernet.
It was just a couple of weeks ago that DirecWay accounced they were closing up...
You're thinking DirecTVDSL, their land-line based DSL service (they bought out Telocity a while back). DirecWay will still be around.
Travis
- He had trouble getting around Windows, just to run the company-provided software installer.
- He was unable to prove that he knew the difference between a USB connector and an RJ-45.
- He could not tell me whether or not I could purchase a device to hook up the sattelite directly to an ethernet network.
- He was unable to produce a copy of the license to which I was agreeing.
- When asked to hook up the rest of my computers, he told me that he was not allowed.
- Later, he told me that the satellite dish could only support one computer.
- He told me that I would have to buy a different satellite dish for each computer I wished to put on the DirecWAY service.
I may be slightly biassed, but DirecWAY seems to be a bit lacking in some areas. Is this anyone else's experience with DirecWAY installers?there is a hack documented online (google for it you lazy ass) that tells how you can open up the back of the modem and you'll find a regular ethernet port that you can plug into, sans all their software. the hack details how to do it for a linux machine, and yes, there is still a bit of software you'll have to install on it...
here are some keywords to help ya out:
direcpc linux ethernet hack
Large print giveth, and the small print taketh away
I had the one-way system, then upgraded to the two-way system about a year ago. I bought a PC with W98SE just to do the connection.
In my experience, the 800ms. to 2500 ms. latency resulted in a throughput that was occasionally, but not usually, much faster than a good modem connection, even out here in the boonies where 26.6Kbps is a rare blessing. I did days of testing and complaining over the entire 2 year period.
My gross throughput was generally about 7KBps - comparable to ISDN. There were peaks up to 150KBps, but also periods of 20 seconds with no data transfer at all. For file transfers the latency was not as much of a problem as it was for surfing.
Over the 2 years I had the two systems I spent a number of hours on the support line going through the motions of yet-again 'reinstall the software', and 'turn off the power, wait five minutes, then turn it on again', because the support people were generally gracious but rarely competent, and the system was troublesome, buggy and unreliable..
The Windows ICS barely worked at all. I did try one of the 3rd party firewall/proxy software packages which greatly improved performance, but never spent the $80 to buy it after the 30 day eval.
At one point I went almost two full months without service, because the support people were too incompetent to figure out the (simple, version related) problem. I went through three layers of telephone support on that one and threatened to sue them. I asked for but never received reimbursement for this loss of service.
A couple of months ago I dropped the service for both frustration and budgetary reasons, and in general I am more pleased with the performance of my dialup line. I see little reason to go back to either DPC or Direcway. In fact, I have two dishes available for sale, as I'm moving soon.
There's a paper online somewhere that demonstrates very aptly why latency is much more important than bandwidth in determining the performance of a connection. The writer points out that most modems have about 10X the latency that they should have. But it's still an order of magnitude better than DPC.
One more consideration. Direcway has established a "Fair Access Policy", for basically good reasons, however badly it's implemented. If you transfer more than a certain amount in a given hour (I think it's 60MB, but I forget), your connection will be dropped to about 2KB per second, for the next six hours or so. Some folks have written file transfer filters to keep you below the threshold.
The Direcway software drivers are at least as buggy and leaky of memory as MS' own P.O.S., so the PC has to be rebooted every couple of days.
For me, I'm hoping to move somewhere that gives me some other options. The local ISP has been testing a wireless repeater that they figure will be cost effective if they can get 20-50 people to sign up within a 2 mile radius of the repeater. The repeater can be connected via another wireless point-to-point channel with a line of sight of up to 15 miles - this is not Wi-Fi or 802.whatever, but commercial grade stuff that they use to connect businesses in the area with better than T1 speeds. So, if you are in the exurban fringe, there may be some alternatives to DPC. I wouldn't recommend DPC to anybody - except maybe if they live offgrid.
If you decide to get the service, Helius (http://www.helius.com) has a $2500 unix turnkey box that supposedly does this. They promised a $300 Linux software package 2 years ago and put me on the Beta list. Last time I talked to them I got the impression that the product was never going to happen. I don't recall why.
It's easier to be a result of the past, but more fun to be a cause of the future! http://www.spacefinancegroup.com/
http://sourceforge.net/projects/direcpc please post a reply, I'd like to see how it works cause I want to get this myself. I won't allow windows in my house, if I can help it.
Speak for yourself.