ASTRA2Connect

Urban Weigl

2-way internet access. The equipment will cost €250 (probably less to get connected, as it will be subsidised). Monthly price should be between €30 and €50, depending on the package (256kbps-1mbps).

The CPE seems to support triple-play: VoIP, TV and Internet (I'm going to refrain from calling it broadband due to the ping times).

At least satellite Internet might get cheaper now, for those of us without any other option.

You can see the equipment here.

Urban Weigl

From Yahoo Biz:

SES ASTRA Goes Triple Play With ASTRA2Connect
Launch of a Satellite-Based Interactive and Low-Cost Broadband Internet Access

BETZDORF, Luxembourg--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Sept. 8, 2006--SES ASTRA, an SES GLOBAL company (Paris:SESG - News) and (LuxX:SESG), will launch ASTRA2Connect, a fully satellite-based interactive and low-cost broadband internet access to serve the residential market, the small and home offices as well as small and medium enterprises. ASTRA2Connect will provide a full satellite-based "triple play" infrastructure service enabling broadband internet access, voice-over-IP and other content related access services such as IPTV or Video-on-Demand. It is expected to be operational in the first quarter of 2007 and will mainly target homes in Europe, which can not easily get terrestrial broadband internet services.

Ferdinand Kayser, President and CEO of SES ASTRA, says: "ASTRA2Connect is a great innovation that brings broadband internet access to everyone - whenever and wherever. The end-consumers will benefit from an affordable and always-on two-way connectivity. We are proud to offer this revolutionary satellite-based infrastructure and envisage to extend ASTRA2Connect to other regions of the world in the near future."

ASTRA2Connect is currently offered on a wholesale basis to large European service providers such as telecommunication operators, internet service providers and broadband operators that conduct pro-active marketing and sales activities in the residential and small enterprise markets. The necessary equipment consists of an interactive satellite antenna as well as a low-cost and easy-to-install satellite modem. For the design and procurement of the satellite platform and the related modems, SES ASTRA has entered into a cooperation with Newtec, a recognized market leader in satellite communication systems. ASTRA2Connect uses advanced technology developed with the support of the European Space Agency (ESA).

Stan 10

This would be great if it works in Ireland. I can not get Eircom broadband through the landline and Last Mile is in our area and I can not get it either.

Urban Weigl

It will work here fine, subject to a local reseller making it available, however bear in mind that it's still going to be crap satellite internet (mainly high latency making it unsuitable for online gaming and more restrictive fair use policy, compared to xDSL and cable). That being said, at least it won't cost an arm and a leg anymore.

crawler

Sorry to bring dark rain clouds but the foot print initially will not cover Ireland (Astra 2D etc) - No idea when (if) they plan for Ireland to covered.

paulm17781

I'd be surprised if it would work for decent VOIP either. Latency and what not.

Sponge Bob

crawler wrote:

Sorry to bring dark rain clouds but the foot print initially will not cover Ireland (Astra 2D etc) - No idea when (if) they plan for Ireland to covered.

That 2D beam will cover Ireland but only with a 2m dish or bigger , I must write to Minister Dempsey and get a grant from his department to test this advanced technology and most preferably deploy in an area of OUTSTANDING beauty too !

Urban Weigl

paulm17781 wrote:

I'd be surprised if it would work for decent VOIP either. Latency and what not.

ASTRA say it is optimised for VoIP and will work very well for that. I assume they are only referring to their own VoIP service, though, so if you're talking about using a third party provider (like blueface) with it, you're statement is correct.

Edit: That's good to know about the coverage in Ireland. The articles I read about it all seemed to imply that it would work anywhere Europe subject to a local reseller making it available.

probe

Sponge Bob wrote:

That 2D beam will cover Ireland but only with a 2m dish or bigger , I must write to Minister Dempsey and get a grant from his department to test this advanced technology and most preferably deploy in an area of OUTSTANDING beauty too !

I know it would be nice to put up a massively ugly dish somewhere in the Wicklow mountains with a slogan on it referring to the fact that you can't get BB - but if they use Astra 2D it should be OK for a smaller dish according to:

http://www.lyngsat-maps.com/maps/astra2d.html

2D provides a 51+ dBW signal (implying a 45cm+ dish) in the so called "UK" which seems to stretch from Iceland to Benelux and Normandy etc.

probe

watty

Astra2D is what Sky / BBC/ITV/RTE use. It won't be Astra 2D.

Maybe crawler means Astra1D and Astra3A? That has a lot of data, and all German beams on 3A and wider European on 1D though some won't work here, other transponders are good on 80cm.

See 1D here (very likely, as all the lygnsat data list is on 1D)
http://www.ses-astra.com/corpSite/site_en/04_ASTRAFleet/03_satellite_list/astra1d/

I have been getting 55% quality on data feeds from Astra1D for some while on a rusty 80cm dish from Sky Analogue era system.

Some transponders OK and some drop off badly as you go west from east coast.

Astra 3A is here:
http://www.ses-astra.com/corpSite/site_en/04_ASTRAFleet/03_satellite_list/astra3a/
On a 1.1m dish you actually can get this badly. On 80cm not at all. It is a German beam, so unlikley for Astra2Connect.

I can't find confirmation of which bird is used. Finally, SES themselves sent me a 90/95cm Triax instead of 80cm dish they sent mainland Europe testers for Astra 1D. For a different data service.

watty

Urban Weigl wrote:

ASTRA say it is optimised for VoIP and will work very well for that. I assume they are only referring to their own VoIP service, though, so if you're talking about using a third party provider (like blueface) with it, you're statement is correct.

Edit: That's good to know about the coverage in Ireland. The articles I read about it all seemed to imply that it would work anywhere Europe subject to a local reseller making it available.

VOIP *WILL* work over sat, but the delay is horrid, if you say "Over" when you want the other guy to talk it helps Specially done VOIP that doen't use IP as such in the Internet sense between the ATA/SIPs/Codecs etc will be better and close to the minimum physical delay of 45,000 miles

If I'm right they "only" need to do a 95cm dish for west and 75cm will work in Dublin (an in west too if it isn't raining!). 1m is planning size limit.

crawler

watty wrote:

Astra2D is what Sky / BBC/ITV/RTE use. It won't be Astra 2D.

Maybe crawler means Astra1D and Astra3A? That has a lot of data, and all German beams on 3A and wider European on 1D though some won't work here, other transponders are good on 80cm.

See 1D here (very likely, as all the lygnsat data list is on 1D)
http://www.ses-astra.com/corpSite/site_en/04_ASTRAFleet/03_satellite_list/astra1d/

I have been getting 55% quality on data feeds from Astra1D for some while on a rusty 80cm dish from Sky Analogue era system.

Some transponders OK and some drop off badly as you go west from east coast.

Astra 3A is here:
http://www.ses-astra.com/corpSite/site_en/04_ASTRAFleet/03_satellite_list/astra3a/
On a 1.1m dish you actually can get this badly. On 80cm not at all. It is a German beam, so unlikley for Astra2Connect.

I can't find confirmation of which bird is used. Finally, SES themselves sent me a 90/95cm Triax instead of 80cm dish they sent mainland Europe testers for Astra 1D. For a different data service.

That is what crawler did mean it WONT be once of the footprints that covers Ireland Such as Astra 2D - middle east birds first I believe.

paulm17781

Urban Weigl wrote:

ASTRA say it is optimised for VoIP and will work very well for that. I assume they are only referring to their own VoIP service,

How did they get around the fact that the satellite is 30,000 miles away?

Sponge Bob

paulm17781 wrote:

How did they get around the fact that the satellite is 30,000 miles away?

Please Paul its only 22000 miles and 30000 km , you exaggerate so .

They could have kludged TCP stacks to reduce the 'appearance of lag' somewhat and maybe generated persistence data at each end of the sat link to clients and servers as the data was coming thru .

They may have optimised a G.7nn codec at the client end and then in a special transparent SIP cache on the sat downlink to earthstation for the delay.....somewhat .

watty

22,500 miles above EQUATOR.. But as you move north further. Also as the satellite is more east or west of due south this makes it further too. That's why it works better in Kenya

Negative refraction on specially created meta materials layered in the atmosphere will create either the illusion of a speedup of the Electromagnetic waves thus reducing delay or cause Snell's law to be scrapped.

Ordinary phone calls often use satellite, or did till more fiber was laid. Though even then the recommendatio was no more than 2 hops and only for one direction of the phone call.

100% "ordinary" IP traffic can double or quadruple satellite delay, hence "good" sat systems cache ARP, DNS and fake packet acknowledgement so that the data as close as possible sees just the single up/down delay (Sponge's kludged TCP stacks). UDP traffic is not so bad...

So "optimised" codecs will work better than plain IP kind.

KevinQ

Hi I was just reading through this thread and would like to inform you that Astra 2 Connect is here already it was launched this week by a cork company you can check it out at Munster Audio & Visual. The sysstem uses a 79cm dish and you can incorperate sky or fta television with the one dish which is fantastic, At the moment prices are purchase equiptment only which costs €699 which is the installed price or €599 for a self install kit. There are 4 price bands and the best bit there is no download limit like the new eutelsat service announced this week by irish broadband and it is €100 cheaper than them as they charge €799 plus VAT. They tell me they will start equiptment rental as soon as they sort out legal stuff but at the moment its credit card only.

Sponge Bob

FFS It is still Officially NBB so I take it MAV are an NBB reseller .

MAV did not bother their holes explaining the throttling in the FUP either , don't like that !

You get chopped down to 64k once you hit your cap which is about 2gb max .

KevinQ

no they are nothing to do with NBB they only just launched here this week I have to wait for my system as they get all stock from uk

Sponge Bob

So they resell for a UK distributor then , which one ??

watty

This Astra2connect which is so good that an existing company trying to sell it for nearly 2 years may be on its last legs? See http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=2055479933

Besides it's cost reduced obsolete technology (only 500mW ODU) on a beam that is poor for Ireland. No upgrade other than a new system. Very limited speed and high contention.

The dish is too small for South Western part of Ireland in Rain.

cgarvey

Kevin, read the forum charter before posting (after your 1 month ban has been lifted).

It would take a brave person to order expensive equipment from a website registered to a person (not a company), that displays no contact details other than a mobile number, and which makes unsubstantiated claims whilst deliberately hiding some crucial details. Oh, and paying by Paypal, of course, to a personal email address (remarkably similar to the username that posted the recommendation above!). Did I mention the pimiping (or shrilling)?

I've no beef with any provider offering their services here, as long as they are specifically responding to a genuine query.