Hi Tim, Thursday, June 29, 2006, 11:47:55 AM, you wrote: > Patrick Murphy wrote: >>>Ask a LOT of questions. I notice on one web page that mentions them >>>that for some of their solutions they are re-selling Direcway >>>services. Their VSAT service sounds interesting though. >> >> I want to mention your negative experience with Direcway to them. > We had seen a demonstration of the system before we bought it so we > knew what we were getting into. At the time it was the least costly > alternative. We did not want to pay for a dedicated data line each > month to serve a few users. The nearest town is about 18 miles away > and the installation and ongoing costs would have been very high. A second satellite ISP has called back, selling Direcway, although the name is apparently changing to Hughesnet. Galaxy Broadband is a Canadian reseller (partner?) and is now willing to allow us to rent space on their site to run a "private gateway." This private gateway is similar to the community gateway that Shawn brought up earlier, but hosted at the ISP (for around $1,000 a month). They are willing to route all of our communities through that gateway, and we and/or they would maintain it. Unlike the first Satellite ISP, they don't have a five figure setup fee, and also, each user would have a separate account, so we wouldn't be sharing bandwidth. After the setup costs, they want $70 a month per user, and $1,000 per month for the housing the equipment. Assuming 40 users, that amounts to $25 each, for a total monthly fee of around $100.00. They said if users located in the US also wanted to be routed through our gateway, they would allow it. They are also looking into whether a single content filtering device, such as the FortiGate I mentioned, or another they favor called a SnapVPN could be used at their location. He has offered to cooperate in setting up a pilot site. >> However, as I see it, the land line, long distance market is rapidly >> changing. We are paying 4.5 cents a minute to call within Canada, but >> the competition (i.e. www.telehop.com) is offering as low as 3 cents >> (and only a flat $10 fee for residential!), so how much we should pay >> monthly for a land-based, broadband Internet connection should take >> this into account. > It is a wild business. The one thing is to try and keep capital > equipment costs low and avoid long term commitments if you can so > changing as new things become available is easier financially. Good point. I'll have to find out what commitment, if any, we have with our current long distance provider, and what commitment the competitors are requiring. -- Best regards, Patrick Murphy James Valley Colony -- http://www.piclist.com PIC/SX FAQ & list archive View/change your membership options at http://mailman.mit.edu/mailman/listinfo/piclist