balibroadband.net

There are basically two (2) major commonly used satellite based IP backbone technologies, namely,

* Single Channel Per Carrier (SCPC).
* Digital Video Broadcasting (DVB).

SCPC technology is basically a dedicated medium, in which the satellite link is used for point to point only and not shared with other users. The quality of service of SCPC link is excellent. Unfortunately, a 64Kbps SCPC link would cost us in Indonesia about US$2000-2500/ month.

To save on cost, one must share the satellite bandwidth/access with others and divide the cost respectively. Digital Video Broadcasting (DVB) technology has the ability to share a single satellite downlink to many users. The end users need to decode the data transmitted from the satellite through a DVB card, costing about US$100-150, and plug in a Windows or Linux box that will act as a router for the rest of the network. Thus, a DVB box is an incoming solution for the incoming traffic from the Internet to the neighborhood or city wide network.

Some DVB technology uses the normal terrestrial network, such as, dial-up or 2.4GHz WiFi, to route the outgoing traffic to the Internet. In some cases, getting a dial-up or 2.4GHz WiFi access to a local Internet Service Provider (ISP) is out of question. In such cases, we need satellite access for both incoming and out going traffic. The most commonly used DVB based technology for both incoming and outgoing traffic is the DVB/FTDMA technology. Both incoming and outgoing traffic is shared over the satellite link. For a 64Kbps DVB/FTDMA installation, shared access may cost US$200-700/month depending on whether we rent or have our own VSAT ground station.

It is common to see a US$700/month DVB/FTDMA VSAT access point shared in a city wide area network through WiFi 2.4GHz City Wide Network, and then shared again through a UTP/LAN neighborhood network to reach US$15-30/month/house.

Let us now review some of the Satellite based IP backbone providers that run the service in Indonesia.