Why is satelite internet SO bad for games?

[Whitman82]

I switched from dial-up to satelite because i thought it would be better for games. Heck i didn't care if it was the tiniest improvement as long as it was an improvement. But this thing is friggen worse. ALOT WORSE. I mean, i don't understand. It costs about $900 for the dish and another $60 a month, how could it not be better for that much money? Does anyone know the reasoning behind this? Oh and by the way, I would get dsl or cable if i didn't live in bum f#cking egypt.

[Rifleman]

yeah , dsl & cable are not available in the place I live because it is some how about 2 km from the town where I can get dsl , and satelite connection sometimes suc*ed so much exspecially uploading , its max kbps is only 256

[MarD]

Heyyo,

Simple my friend, cause ya know how when you change channels when you first get the new channel feed it comes in all pixelated at first and then finally smoothens out? well, when online gaming, it's constantly receiving new feed n' sending out new feed eh? so really, it's hard for satelite to provide a fluid online gaming experience cause of this... the only fast satelite I believe is a T1 connection....

[@$3.1415rin]

there is no satellite connection which has low ping, because the speed of light is so fuckin' slow

[sfx1999]

T1 is not a satellite connection. It is hardwired.

The reason satellite is laggy is because it has to be encoded, transmitted into space, then sent back down. Not to mention that your modem has to send data to the transmitting station, which would lag because of the distance.

[stefanhendriks]

apart from that, depening on your account, some satelites only recieve data but SEND data through phone line (yeah, its odd... i know). So it won't work good for games (which needs a constant upload as well).

for downloading files i saw you can reach with ease 300k, so that should not be the problem. Also, i read for gaming it does work, so perhaps you did not tune it 100% right yet?

[Whitman82]

I've had a couple people tell me that they actually can sorta play online, but they didn't say how. Where did you read this? I was playing Tribes Vengeance online earlier, and i maintained a 800-850 ping, which is almost as good as it was with dial up. So if theres somethings i have to change or what not, hopefully it can improve my ping a bit.

[Huntkillaz]

Originally Posted by Whitman82

I've had a couple people tell me that they actually can sorta play online, but they didn't say how. Where did you read this? I was playing Tribes Vengeance online earlier, and i maintained a 800-850 ping, which is almost as good as it was with dial up. So if theres somethings i have to change or what not, hopefully it can improve my ping a bit.

my friend tells me it's pretty much the same as 56k only maybe slightly better

[stefanhendriks]

but how is ur download speed?....

[von Ryan]

Well, I'm shooting in the dark, but wouldn't radio internet be better?