I see on my Exede Portal the Liberty Plan is enabled and a little graph below it showing the green, yellow, and red time slots throughout a 24 hour period - which mimic the policy documents that can be found online, however I think it would be very much appreciated if this information could be based on real statistics and change with real time as well as provide a history over the last 24 hours or so.
This accomplishes two things:
1. It finally let's users see what is happening on their connections that might be affecting the performance of their internet experience.
2. Goes a long way to give some transparency to Exede.
I see lots of posts about speed issues, or congestion issues, or lots of upset customers wondering why this or that is so slow. I would bet there are infinitely more users that are frustrated by the same things being posted about that either don't know about this forum or don't feel like posting here that feel the same way.
I think this would be a great addition to the user portal in addition to the more granular usage meters we have all been requesting.
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Posted 4 years ago
LorrieL, Champion
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The talk about congestion has been going on and on for many months now, on this message board, and many (like me) see it as increasing....I do think Exede needs to speak up directly about this issue.
I don't expect any kind of perfection in this world, including not from my internet provider...I believe that Exede has not done anything intentionally to cause this problem...and that they are taking what steps than can to reduce the problem. However, it is not "right" for exede to continue to promise speeds that they cannot deliver to every customer who signs up for the plan for which those promises are made.
If, because I live in beam 329, which is said by posters here to be "congested", I can no longer expect to receive download speeds averaging 10-12 Mbps, then Exede needs to TELL me that openly.
I have always had a positive attitude toward Exede, but that will not continue unless they are more open about what speeds they can actually deliver.
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Congestion goes back years, it rears its head every year at this time and summer can be problematic as well. I have never had Exede try to hide the fact when I call in and ask about it, in fact they usually tell me it is being heavily utilized at that time.
I would seriously call in to support and have them review your account and your modem history and see if they can find any reason for your exceptionally sow speeds.
LorrieL, Champion
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You know, when you are PAYING for a plan that says you will get such and such speeds, and providers often charge more for the higher speeds, please don't say it doesn't matter what the speed is as long as you can "do what you want". That isn't how it is supposed to work in the world of paid contracts, as I know you know.
Frankly, I WOULD be a satisfied customer IF exede did a thorough check to help me determine if there is ANY other reason my speeds are slow besides some kind of exede congestion problem (my daytime speeds are often higher than what I posted here, but I didn't sign a contract saying I would only get 10-12 download during daylight hours!) And I would even still be a satisfied customer if exede would say, hey we now have this un anticipated congestion problem and no we can't promise you 10-12 download speeds 24/7 anymore....the truth is terribly important to me as a customer.
I have only one thing connected to my router....my laptop....and I have connected my laptop periodiclaly directly to the modem and still see the same slow speeds....so when I see all these people complaining about slow speeds during prime time, I know very well that I am not alone in this.
LorrieL, Champion
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I was really VERY surprised today when I looked at just how consistently low my speeds are, because as you say, I CAN do what I want, even with those slow speeds---but why in the world should that make it OK for exede to claim higher average speeds than they are delivering?
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LorrieL, Champion
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And if there were such a visual way to know about congestion on the ISP you are using, wouldn't that in this case have perhaps shown right away that the problem was unlikely to be a Comcast congestion problem?
(Or am I missing something in what you are saying?)
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Ultimately I am willing to bet the mysterious men and women who are the engineers running the network at Exede can give a fairly accurate guess as to the speeds users should be seeing based on the current traffic and congestion at a given time.
I get that not all hosts and sites are created equal, however I also feel that if you make it relatively simple and easy to understand, it may save a lot of headaches in the future by heading off calls before they start.
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Steve Frederick-VS1/Beam314, Champion
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For now a general categorized breakdown is about the best that can be expected from ViaSat - and I'm pretty sure Exede Alex, Brad, Lindsey, Diana, etc are glad they don't have to be placed in an awkard position of tellling someone's significant other that all of their data was consumed with in an Online Chat with Jake from State Farm who wears khakis and she sounds hideous... ;)
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I'd also like to suggest the ability for a user to drill deeper down into their useage such as where is my data being used - Video's (can they tell us where (Amazon, Netflix, ...), software downloads (updates from Microsoft, Apple, ...), software gaming, uploads (to where?) .... I'd also like a "Time Stamp" as to when the last measurement was taken in regards to the "Data Used" # shown on our dashboard.In order to get at this information, Exede would essentially track every site you visit and everything you do. I personally don't think I care, however this raises fairly significant privacy concerns.
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LorrieL, Champion
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So, how do you interpret that data that you were sent JEP?--I don't have the knowledge to know---what would be a level of usage where there wouldn't be expected to be a noticeable problem (ie, there wouldn't be a "congestion problem"?
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LorrieL, Champion
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Have you tried mousing over the indicator for more info or clicking on it? I would but obviously can't.
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Steve Frederick-VS1/Beam314, Champion
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Steve Frederick-VS1/Beam314, Champion
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I have "yellow" lights for Antenna Pointing, Signal Quality and Packet Loss. I did get a Green on Signal Quality once earlier today. I have a Rx SNR reading of 6.7, which is what I have been seeing over the 4 years I have had Exede. It sometimes goes up to 7.5, but during bad weather will drop to 3.0, and my internet works just fine, with normal speeds.
Back in early December I had an Exede Tech at my house to change out a modem that was dropping my connection with the big silver bird in the sky 6 to 8 times a day, and when he was here, he checked out everything and didn't see anything that was messing up. So I am not too concerned with those yellow indications, although, I think that there will be lots more calls to the Exede call centers because of the yellow lights that may or may not really be a real problem.
All in all, I think this is a good tool, and with better indications of the data usage, and beam congestion, will help those who want to know this information.
Also, the speed test option is a great idea, since it measures speed between the modem and the satellite, and is not influenced by the computer or router in the home network.
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Alex, Viasat Corporate Communications
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Since it appears that ViaSat 2 isn't going to be the saving grace for many customers any time soon, it may be time to resurrect this idea. Access to this information could be limited to subscribers, and then we would know whether our problem is related to congestion or other issues. As Viasat 2 becomes more widely accessible, the system could then be kept in place and it would help existing customers decide whether they want to stay with Viasat 1 or migrate to Viasat 2 when it becomes available in their area.
Last night I had several updates to do and it was unusually slow. We were having thunderstorms so I figured it was due to weather fade. But it would have been nice to be able to log in and see if it was due to a congested beam.
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cloverdavid
Brian Shackelford
Old Labs (VS1-329-L12FZ)
Some discussion of releasing a subscriber version over in the other forum.
Some of us were invited to participate in a beta that has yet to materialize and appears it's hung up in an administrative approval process.
So the only question is will they? FWIW ViaSat, transparency is actually a good thing.