Re: xplornet contact or any experience with their satellite service?

2020-04-23 Thread Brian J. Murrell
On Tue, 2020-04-21 at 18:54 +, Mel Beckman wrote:
> It’s not really oversold bandwidth. It’s just that the turnaround
> time for a bolus of data is too long for two-way video conferencing
> to be smooth or reliable. It’s like video conferencing using post
> cards :)

Except that videoconferencing is just the victim of the problem, and
the problem is bursty bandwidth not latency.  In fact, the back-and-
forth of conversation is actually surprisingly decent for satellite. 
Not as much "talking over" as I would have suspected.

But put the victim application aside, the real data is in the iperf3
results I posted, demonstrating how bursty the throughput is.  The
problem with that of course is that the "lowest" bandwidth "valleys"
becomes the "constant bandwidth" that the codec uses rather than the
average -- which of course cannot be used for real-time VC.

Cheers,
b.



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Re: xplornet contact or any experience with their satellite service?

2020-04-22 Thread Olav Kvittem via NANOG

On 21.04.2020 20:59, Brandon Martin wrote:

On 4/21/20 2:35 PM, Brian J. Murrell wrote:

Interesting.  So basically as Mel said, over-sold network.  :-(

This is pretty typical of consumer VSAT and such.  You can of course get better performance...if 
you're willing to pay for it.  If you find the right carrier/re-seller, you can perhaps find one 
whose "system" (to include ground station, terminals, and smarts on the bird) can respect 
DSCP and flag at least your voice traffic appropriately (probably EF) to perhaps lower the jitter 
and make conferencing more palatable.  Finding competent folks at a typical consumer provider's 
helpdesk to talk to about such things is probably the limiting factor.  The higher up the foodchain 
you go towards the folks who "own" the spectrum rather than re-sell will perhaps get you 
more luck on something like this though probably also at higher MRC.

Unfortunately, it's just what happens when you spread an already limited 
resource (transponder bandwidth) out over essentially an entire continent or at 
least substantial portions of it.  Imagine if you had a cable provider with a 
single node for an entire, say, US state.


Could be interesting to do  one-way-delay measurements in parallel to 
see how the packets are travelling


and where and how big the queues are (Bufferbloat).

Likeways if you have a unix system you could look at tcp statistics

to see if you have packet retransmits (netstat -s).

As previously noted TDMA between uploading or even ACK'ing users could 
be a bottleneck for the download speed.



Olav



Re: xplornet contact or any experience with their satellite service?

2020-04-21 Thread Brandon Martin
On 4/21/20 2:54 PM, Mel Beckman wrote:
> It’s not really oversold bandwidth. It’s just that the turnaround time for a 
> bolus of data is too long for two-way video conferencing to be smooth or 
> reliable. It’s like video conferencing using post cards :)

Are consumer satellite provider networks TDD or FDD?  I guess I had assumed the 
latter, but maybe not?

Assuming FDD, I don't see why the downstream needs to necessarily have problems 
with extremely long user-data-striping periods unless there's some factor I am 
just totally not considering.

The upstream is of course more of a problem.  I assume it's TDMA, and the 
terminals have imperfect clocks.
-- 
Brandon Martin


Re: xplornet contact or any experience with their satellite service?

2020-04-21 Thread Brandon Martin
On 4/21/20 2:35 PM, Brian J. Murrell wrote:
> Interesting.  So basically as Mel said, over-sold network.  :-(

This is pretty typical of consumer VSAT and such.  You can of course get better 
performance...if you're willing to pay for it.  If you find the right 
carrier/re-seller, you can perhaps find one whose "system" (to include ground 
station, terminals, and smarts on the bird) can respect DSCP and flag at least 
your voice traffic appropriately (probably EF) to perhaps lower the jitter and 
make conferencing more palatable.  Finding competent folks at a typical 
consumer provider's helpdesk to talk to about such things is probably the 
limiting factor.  The higher up the foodchain you go towards the folks who 
"own" the spectrum rather than re-sell will perhaps get you more luck on 
something like this though probably also at higher MRC.

Unfortunately, it's just what happens when you spread an already limited 
resource (transponder bandwidth) out over essentially an entire continent or at 
least substantial portions of it.  Imagine if you had a cable provider with a 
single node for an entire, say, US state.
-- 
Brandon Martin


Re: xplornet contact or any experience with their satellite service?

2020-04-21 Thread Mel Beckman
It’s not really oversold bandwidth. It’s just that the turnaround time for a 
bolus of data is too long for two-way video conferencing to be smooth or 
reliable. It’s like video conferencing using post cards :)

 -mel 

> On Apr 21, 2020, at 11:36 AM, Brian J. Murrell  wrote:
> 
> On Tue, 2020-04-21 at 11:11 -0700, Sabri Berisha wrote:
>> Hi,
> 
> Hi,
> 
>> Where I worked, phy transmissions are scheduled based on tokens. A UT
>> must have a token to transmit data. If there is no congestion, a
>> token will be available and the UT or ground station may transmit.
>> Congestion does not need to exist in the ground network or even the
>> transponder. It can even be in the spectrum of that geographical
>> area. 
> 
> Interesting.  So basically as Mel said, over-sold network.  :-(
> 
>> To overcome the latency,
> 
> Latency (AFAIU) is not really his primary issue.  it's the lack of
> consistency in bandwidth.  Periods of a second or two even where there
> is no transmission of anything at all followed by a second or two of
> transmission bursting even beyond his subscribed "rate".  This effects
> his subscribed rate but in a really bad way for real-time traffic such
> as live/two-way video.  He'd much, much more rather get a consistent
> pipe at his prescribed rate rather than an average of it over longer
> periods of time because then the codec would not have be encoding for
> those super bad periods of time where there are 1-2 seconds of no
> bandwidth at all.
> 
>> Satellite is obviously not the optimal medium for video conferencing,
> 
> Indeed.
> 
>> but I would recommend that your friend tries to ratelimit their
>> transmissions.
> 
> He doesn't need to.  The over-congested network is doing that for him. 
> :-(  In any case, I don't know that he has any way to put a rate limit
> on the tools he is using.
> 
>> The reason why your latency is higher than you expect,
> 
> It actually isn't.  It's nowhere near as high as I had come to
> (anecdotally -- I'd never had reason to do the math on the latency
> before now) believe it would be.
> 
> Fortunately he might be a candidate for Xplornet (or others') WISP
> services.  Hopefully they are a bit more stable.
> 
> Cheers,
> b.
> 


Re: xplornet contact or any experience with their satellite service?

2020-04-21 Thread Brian J. Murrell
On Tue, 2020-04-21 at 11:11 -0700, Sabri Berisha wrote:
> Hi,

Hi,

> Where I worked, phy transmissions are scheduled based on tokens. A UT
> must have a token to transmit data. If there is no congestion, a
> token will be available and the UT or ground station may transmit.
> Congestion does not need to exist in the ground network or even the
> transponder. It can even be in the spectrum of that geographical
> area. 

Interesting.  So basically as Mel said, over-sold network.  :-(

> To overcome the latency,

Latency (AFAIU) is not really his primary issue.  it's the lack of
consistency in bandwidth.  Periods of a second or two even where there
is no transmission of anything at all followed by a second or two of
transmission bursting even beyond his subscribed "rate".  This effects
his subscribed rate but in a really bad way for real-time traffic such
as live/two-way video.  He'd much, much more rather get a consistent
pipe at his prescribed rate rather than an average of it over longer
periods of time because then the codec would not have be encoding for
those super bad periods of time where there are 1-2 seconds of no
bandwidth at all.

> Satellite is obviously not the optimal medium for video conferencing,

Indeed.

> but I would recommend that your friend tries to ratelimit their
> transmissions.

He doesn't need to.  The over-congested network is doing that for him. 
:-(  In any case, I don't know that he has any way to put a rate limit
on the tools he is using.

> The reason why your latency is higher than you expect,

It actually isn't.  It's nowhere near as high as I had come to
(anecdotally -- I'd never had reason to do the math on the latency
before now) believe it would be.

Fortunately he might be a candidate for Xplornet (or others') WISP
services.  Hopefully they are a bit more stable.

Cheers,
b.



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Re: xplornet contact or any experience with their satellite service?

2020-04-21 Thread Sabri Berisha
Hi,

I used to work for a satellite ISP, and if I'm not mistaken Xplornet is buying 
bandwidth of my previous employer. That does not mean that your friend is on 
the same service.

Where I worked, phy transmissions are scheduled based on tokens. A UT must have 
a token to transmit data. If there is no congestion, a token will be available 
and the UT or ground station may transmit. Congestion does not need to exist in 
the ground network or even the transponder. It can even be in the spectrum of 
that geographical area. 

To overcome the latency, a few things are done:

- prefetching on the UT
- WAN acceleration on the UT and in the network (basically syn/ack spoofing)

and a few other proprietary things. 

Satellite is obviously not the optimal medium for video conferencing, but I 
would recommend that your friend tries to ratelimit their transmissions.

The reason why your latency is higher than you expect, is because you expect 
latency to be equivalent to the round-trip time from earth to GEO and back. 
However, most of the time your UT will not be with the shortest line-of-sight, 
meaning the distance is longer. Also, the satellite merely acts as a smart 
mirror, and the traffic must still be backhauled from a groundstation to a 
processing location. They can also be several tens of milliseconds away. Then 
they must follow their normal path along the internet.

Ping me off-list if you have specific questions. 

Thanks, 

Sabri

- On Apr 21, 2020, at 4:58 AM, Brian J. Murrell br...@interlinx.bc.ca wrote:

> A friend of mine just recently got Xplornet satellite service at his
> rural home.  I'm well aware of the latency issues with satellite
> although frankly his latency is much better than I had feared it would
> be and is around 600-700ms.
> 
> But what seems to be worse than the latency is the "burstiness" of the
> traffic and I am just wondering if that is normal/expected for
> satellite service in general, and/or expected from Xplornet's service,
> or if what I am seeing is not expected at all (i.e. not an artifact of
> the satellite signal but rather a network management issue).
> 
> Here's iperf3 for 30 seconds sending data (i.e. upload speed):
> 
> [ ID] Interval   Transfer Bitrate
> [  5]   0.00-1.21   sec  12.9 KBytes  87.4 Kbits/sec
> [  5]   1.21-2.00   sec  6.47 KBytes  67.2 Kbits/sec
> [  5]   2.00-3.00   sec  22.0 KBytes   180 Kbits/sec
> [  5]   3.00-4.00   sec  41.4 KBytes   339 Kbits/sec
> [  5]   4.00-5.00   sec  41.4 KBytes   339 Kbits/sec
> [  5]   5.00-6.00   sec  55.6 KBytes   456 Kbits/sec
> [  5]   6.00-7.00   sec  69.9 KBytes   572 Kbits/sec
> [  5]   7.00-8.00   sec  89.3 KBytes   731 Kbits/sec
> [  5]   8.00-9.00   sec   120 KBytes   986 Kbits/sec
> [  5]   9.00-10.00  sec  86.7 KBytes   710 Kbits/sec
> [  5]  10.00-11.00  sec   133 KBytes  1.09 Mbits/sec
> [  5]  11.00-12.00  sec   184 KBytes  1.51 Mbits/sec
> [  5]  12.00-13.00  sec   186 KBytes  1.53 Mbits/sec
> [  5]  13.00-14.00  sec   159 KBytes  1.30 Mbits/sec
> [  5]  14.00-15.00  sec  0.00 Bytes  0.00 bits/sec
> [  5]  15.00-16.00  sec  0.00 Bytes  0.00 bits/sec
> [  5]  16.00-17.00  sec  93.2 KBytes   763 Kbits/sec
> [  5]  17.00-18.00  sec   264 KBytes  2.16 Mbits/sec
> [  5]  18.00-19.00  sec   124 KBytes  1.02 Mbits/sec
> [  5]  19.00-20.00  sec   157 KBytes  1.28 Mbits/sec
> [  5]  20.00-21.00  sec   120 KBytes   986 Kbits/sec
> [  5]  21.00-22.00  sec  86.7 KBytes   710 Kbits/sec
> [  5]  22.00-23.00  sec   369 KBytes  3.02 Mbits/sec
> [  5]  23.00-24.00  sec   197 KBytes  1.61 Mbits/sec
> [  5]  24.00-25.00  sec  90.6 KBytes   741 Kbits/sec
> [  5]  25.00-26.00  sec   193 KBytes  1.58 Mbits/sec
> [  5]  26.00-27.00  sec   192 KBytes  1.57 Mbits/sec
> [  5]  27.00-28.00  sec   189 KBytes  1.55 Mbits/sec
> [  5]  28.00-29.00  sec   193 KBytes  1.58 Mbits/sec
> [  5]  29.00-30.00  sec   179 KBytes  1.46 Mbits/sec
> - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
> [ ID] Interval   Transfer Bitrate Retr
> [  5]   0.00-32.20  sec  4.41 MBytes  1.15 Mbits/sec  388 sender
> [  5]   0.00-30.00  sec  3.57 MBytes   998 Kbits/sec  receiver
> 
> which averaged the overall prescribed "upload" speed, but notice that
> it's not 1Mb/s in any kind of a steady stream but rather bursts of
> higher than 1Mb/s speed followed by low/no speed.  At one point it was
> 2 seconds with no transfer at all even.
> 
> and here's receiving (i.e. "download"):
> 
> [ ID] Interval   Transfer Bitrate Retr  Cwnd
> [  5]   0.00-1.35   sec  46.6 KBytes   283 Kbits/sec0   12.9 KBytes
> [  5]   1.35-2.00   sec  0.00 Bytes  0.00 bits/sec0   12.9 KBytes
> [  5]   2.00-3.00   sec  67.3 KBytes   551 Kbits/sec0   37.5 KBytes
> [  5]   3.00-4.00   sec  46.6 KBytes   382 Kbits/sec0   40.1 KBytes
> [  5]   4.00-5.00   sec   105 KBytes   858 Kbits/sec0   44.0 KBytes
> [  5]   5.00-6.00   sec  88.0 KBytes   721 Kbits/sec0   54.3 KBytes
> [  5]   

Re: xplornet contact or any experience with their satellite service?

2020-04-21 Thread Adam Thompson
Although I don't know of a way to solve this for videoconferencing, 
historically one way to mitigate the radio/vsat "batchiness" issue and its 
effect on end-to-end latency was to use a caching proxy server connected to a, 
er, "real" network somewhere, preferably as near as possible to the 
headend/uplink station.  The modern web's move to TLS also means this technique 
is becoming pointless even for HTTP/S (although MITMing remains a way around 
that - many a HOWTO abounds, describing how to do this with Squid).


FWIW, some very old radio systems behaved similarly... albeit not with 600+msec 
latency :-/.  Some of the really old asymmetric TV systems (dial-up for uplink, 
CATV for downlink) exhibited similar characteristics and were similarly 
difficult to mitigate.


Good luck!


Adam Thompson
Consultant, Infrastructure Services
[[MERLIN LOGO]]
100 - 135 Innovation Drive
Winnipeg, MB, R3T 6A8
(204) 977-6824 or 1-800-430-6404 (MB only)
athomp...@merlin.mb.ca<mailto:athomp...@merlin.mb.ca>
www.merlin.mb.ca<http://www.merlin.mb.ca/>


From: NANOG  on behalf of Mel Beckman 

Sent: Tuesday, April 21, 2020 9:05:20 AM
To: Brian J. Murrell
Cc: nanog@nanog.org
Subject: Re: xplornet contact or any experience with their satellite service?

Brian,

Satellite services are shared bandwidth broadcast systems. The behavior you’re 
seeing is pretty common at times when you’re competing for access with other 
users. Just like the regular Internet, there are times of day when people tend 
to move more data, and because of latency and other limitations on 
bidirectional traffic, packets get delivered in batches. It’s not possible to 
interleave bytes, or even packets themselves.

So when you see low or no throughput, it’s because the transponder is 
addressing packets to other users.

 -mel beckman

> On Apr 21, 2020, at 6:53 AM, Brian J. Murrell  wrote:
>
> A friend of mine just recently got Xplornet satellite service at his
> rural home.  I'm well aware of the latency issues with satellite
> although frankly his latency is much better than I had feared it would
> be and is around 600-700ms.
>
> But what seems to be worse than the latency is the "burstiness" of the
> traffic and I am just wondering if that is normal/expected for
> satellite service in general, and/or expected from Xplornet's service,
> or if what I am seeing is not expected at all (i.e. not an artifact of
> the satellite signal but rather a network management issue).
>
> Here's iperf3 for 30 seconds sending data (i.e. upload speed):
>
> [ ID] Interval   Transfer Bitrate
> [  5]   0.00-1.21   sec  12.9 KBytes  87.4 Kbits/sec
> [  5]   1.21-2.00   sec  6.47 KBytes  67.2 Kbits/sec
> [  5]   2.00-3.00   sec  22.0 KBytes   180 Kbits/sec
> [  5]   3.00-4.00   sec  41.4 KBytes   339 Kbits/sec
> [  5]   4.00-5.00   sec  41.4 KBytes   339 Kbits/sec
> [  5]   5.00-6.00   sec  55.6 KBytes   456 Kbits/sec
> [  5]   6.00-7.00   sec  69.9 KBytes   572 Kbits/sec
> [  5]   7.00-8.00   sec  89.3 KBytes   731 Kbits/sec
> [  5]   8.00-9.00   sec   120 KBytes   986 Kbits/sec
> [  5]   9.00-10.00  sec  86.7 KBytes   710 Kbits/sec
> [  5]  10.00-11.00  sec   133 KBytes  1.09 Mbits/sec
> [  5]  11.00-12.00  sec   184 KBytes  1.51 Mbits/sec
> [  5]  12.00-13.00  sec   186 KBytes  1.53 Mbits/sec
> [  5]  13.00-14.00  sec   159 KBytes  1.30 Mbits/sec
> [  5]  14.00-15.00  sec  0.00 Bytes  0.00 bits/sec
> [  5]  15.00-16.00  sec  0.00 Bytes  0.00 bits/sec
> [  5]  16.00-17.00  sec  93.2 KBytes   763 Kbits/sec
> [  5]  17.00-18.00  sec   264 KBytes  2.16 Mbits/sec
> [  5]  18.00-19.00  sec   124 KBytes  1.02 Mbits/sec
> [  5]  19.00-20.00  sec   157 KBytes  1.28 Mbits/sec
> [  5]  20.00-21.00  sec   120 KBytes   986 Kbits/sec
> [  5]  21.00-22.00  sec  86.7 KBytes   710 Kbits/sec
> [  5]  22.00-23.00  sec   369 KBytes  3.02 Mbits/sec
> [  5]  23.00-24.00  sec   197 KBytes  1.61 Mbits/sec
> [  5]  24.00-25.00  sec  90.6 KBytes   741 Kbits/sec
> [  5]  25.00-26.00  sec   193 KBytes  1.58 Mbits/sec
> [  5]  26.00-27.00  sec   192 KBytes  1.57 Mbits/sec
> [  5]  27.00-28.00  sec   189 KBytes  1.55 Mbits/sec
> [  5]  28.00-29.00  sec   193 KBytes  1.58 Mbits/sec
> [  5]  29.00-30.00  sec   179 KBytes  1.46 Mbits/sec
> - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
> [ ID] Interval   Transfer Bitrate Retr
> [  5]   0.00-32.20  sec  4.41 MBytes  1.15 Mbits/sec  388 sender
> [  5]   0.00-30.00  sec  3.57 MBytes   998 Kbits/sec  receiver
>
> which averaged the overall prescribed "upload" speed, but notice that
> it's not 1Mb/s in any kind of a steady stream but rather bursts of
> higher than 1Mb/s speed followed by low/no speed.  At one point it was
> 2 seconds with no transfer at

Re: xplornet contact or any experience with their satellite service?

2020-04-21 Thread Mel Beckman
Brian,

Satellite services are shared bandwidth broadcast systems. The behavior you’re 
seeing is pretty common at times when you’re competing for access with other 
users. Just like the regular Internet, there are times of day when people tend 
to move more data, and because of latency and other limitations on 
bidirectional traffic, packets get delivered in batches. It’s not possible to 
interleave bytes, or even packets themselves. 

So when you see low or no throughput, it’s because the transponder is 
addressing packets to other users.

 -mel beckman

> On Apr 21, 2020, at 6:53 AM, Brian J. Murrell  wrote:
> 
> A friend of mine just recently got Xplornet satellite service at his
> rural home.  I'm well aware of the latency issues with satellite
> although frankly his latency is much better than I had feared it would
> be and is around 600-700ms.
> 
> But what seems to be worse than the latency is the "burstiness" of the
> traffic and I am just wondering if that is normal/expected for
> satellite service in general, and/or expected from Xplornet's service,
> or if what I am seeing is not expected at all (i.e. not an artifact of
> the satellite signal but rather a network management issue).
> 
> Here's iperf3 for 30 seconds sending data (i.e. upload speed):
> 
> [ ID] Interval   Transfer Bitrate
> [  5]   0.00-1.21   sec  12.9 KBytes  87.4 Kbits/sec  
> [  5]   1.21-2.00   sec  6.47 KBytes  67.2 Kbits/sec  
> [  5]   2.00-3.00   sec  22.0 KBytes   180 Kbits/sec  
> [  5]   3.00-4.00   sec  41.4 KBytes   339 Kbits/sec  
> [  5]   4.00-5.00   sec  41.4 KBytes   339 Kbits/sec  
> [  5]   5.00-6.00   sec  55.6 KBytes   456 Kbits/sec  
> [  5]   6.00-7.00   sec  69.9 KBytes   572 Kbits/sec  
> [  5]   7.00-8.00   sec  89.3 KBytes   731 Kbits/sec  
> [  5]   8.00-9.00   sec   120 KBytes   986 Kbits/sec  
> [  5]   9.00-10.00  sec  86.7 KBytes   710 Kbits/sec  
> [  5]  10.00-11.00  sec   133 KBytes  1.09 Mbits/sec  
> [  5]  11.00-12.00  sec   184 KBytes  1.51 Mbits/sec  
> [  5]  12.00-13.00  sec   186 KBytes  1.53 Mbits/sec  
> [  5]  13.00-14.00  sec   159 KBytes  1.30 Mbits/sec  
> [  5]  14.00-15.00  sec  0.00 Bytes  0.00 bits/sec  
> [  5]  15.00-16.00  sec  0.00 Bytes  0.00 bits/sec  
> [  5]  16.00-17.00  sec  93.2 KBytes   763 Kbits/sec  
> [  5]  17.00-18.00  sec   264 KBytes  2.16 Mbits/sec  
> [  5]  18.00-19.00  sec   124 KBytes  1.02 Mbits/sec  
> [  5]  19.00-20.00  sec   157 KBytes  1.28 Mbits/sec  
> [  5]  20.00-21.00  sec   120 KBytes   986 Kbits/sec  
> [  5]  21.00-22.00  sec  86.7 KBytes   710 Kbits/sec  
> [  5]  22.00-23.00  sec   369 KBytes  3.02 Mbits/sec  
> [  5]  23.00-24.00  sec   197 KBytes  1.61 Mbits/sec  
> [  5]  24.00-25.00  sec  90.6 KBytes   741 Kbits/sec  
> [  5]  25.00-26.00  sec   193 KBytes  1.58 Mbits/sec  
> [  5]  26.00-27.00  sec   192 KBytes  1.57 Mbits/sec  
> [  5]  27.00-28.00  sec   189 KBytes  1.55 Mbits/sec  
> [  5]  28.00-29.00  sec   193 KBytes  1.58 Mbits/sec  
> [  5]  29.00-30.00  sec   179 KBytes  1.46 Mbits/sec  
> - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
> [ ID] Interval   Transfer Bitrate Retr
> [  5]   0.00-32.20  sec  4.41 MBytes  1.15 Mbits/sec  388 sender
> [  5]   0.00-30.00  sec  3.57 MBytes   998 Kbits/sec  receiver
> 
> which averaged the overall prescribed "upload" speed, but notice that
> it's not 1Mb/s in any kind of a steady stream but rather bursts of
> higher than 1Mb/s speed followed by low/no speed.  At one point it was
> 2 seconds with no transfer at all even.
> 
> and here's receiving (i.e. "download"):
> 
> [ ID] Interval   Transfer Bitrate Retr  Cwnd
> [  5]   0.00-1.35   sec  46.6 KBytes   283 Kbits/sec0   12.9 KBytes   
> [  5]   1.35-2.00   sec  0.00 Bytes  0.00 bits/sec0   12.9 KBytes   
> [  5]   2.00-3.00   sec  67.3 KBytes   551 Kbits/sec0   37.5 KBytes   
> [  5]   3.00-4.00   sec  46.6 KBytes   382 Kbits/sec0   40.1 KBytes   
> [  5]   4.00-5.00   sec   105 KBytes   858 Kbits/sec0   44.0 KBytes   
> [  5]   5.00-6.00   sec  88.0 KBytes   721 Kbits/sec0   54.3 KBytes   
> [  5]   6.00-7.00   sec   141 KBytes  1.16 Mbits/sec0   69.9 KBytes   
> [  5]   7.00-8.00   sec   124 KBytes  1.02 Mbits/sec0101 KBytes   
> [  5]   8.00-9.00   sec   186 KBytes  1.53 Mbits/sec0146 KBytes   
> [  5]   9.00-10.00  sec   248 KBytes  2.04 Mbits/sec0206 KBytes   
> [  5]  10.00-11.00  

xplornet contact or any experience with their satellite service?

2020-04-21 Thread Brian J. Murrell
A friend of mine just recently got Xplornet satellite service at his
rural home.  I'm well aware of the latency issues with satellite
although frankly his latency is much better than I had feared it would
be and is around 600-700ms.

But what seems to be worse than the latency is the "burstiness" of the
traffic and I am just wondering if that is normal/expected for
satellite service in general, and/or expected from Xplornet's service,
or if what I am seeing is not expected at all (i.e. not an artifact of
the satellite signal but rather a network management issue).

Here's iperf3 for 30 seconds sending data (i.e. upload speed):

[ ID] Interval   Transfer Bitrate
[  5]   0.00-1.21   sec  12.9 KBytes  87.4 Kbits/sec  
[  5]   1.21-2.00   sec  6.47 KBytes  67.2 Kbits/sec  
[  5]   2.00-3.00   sec  22.0 KBytes   180 Kbits/sec  
[  5]   3.00-4.00   sec  41.4 KBytes   339 Kbits/sec  
[  5]   4.00-5.00   sec  41.4 KBytes   339 Kbits/sec  
[  5]   5.00-6.00   sec  55.6 KBytes   456 Kbits/sec  
[  5]   6.00-7.00   sec  69.9 KBytes   572 Kbits/sec  
[  5]   7.00-8.00   sec  89.3 KBytes   731 Kbits/sec  
[  5]   8.00-9.00   sec   120 KBytes   986 Kbits/sec  
[  5]   9.00-10.00  sec  86.7 KBytes   710 Kbits/sec  
[  5]  10.00-11.00  sec   133 KBytes  1.09 Mbits/sec  
[  5]  11.00-12.00  sec   184 KBytes  1.51 Mbits/sec  
[  5]  12.00-13.00  sec   186 KBytes  1.53 Mbits/sec  
[  5]  13.00-14.00  sec   159 KBytes  1.30 Mbits/sec  
[  5]  14.00-15.00  sec  0.00 Bytes  0.00 bits/sec  
[  5]  15.00-16.00  sec  0.00 Bytes  0.00 bits/sec  
[  5]  16.00-17.00  sec  93.2 KBytes   763 Kbits/sec  
[  5]  17.00-18.00  sec   264 KBytes  2.16 Mbits/sec  
[  5]  18.00-19.00  sec   124 KBytes  1.02 Mbits/sec  
[  5]  19.00-20.00  sec   157 KBytes  1.28 Mbits/sec  
[  5]  20.00-21.00  sec   120 KBytes   986 Kbits/sec  
[  5]  21.00-22.00  sec  86.7 KBytes   710 Kbits/sec  
[  5]  22.00-23.00  sec   369 KBytes  3.02 Mbits/sec  
[  5]  23.00-24.00  sec   197 KBytes  1.61 Mbits/sec  
[  5]  24.00-25.00  sec  90.6 KBytes   741 Kbits/sec  
[  5]  25.00-26.00  sec   193 KBytes  1.58 Mbits/sec  
[  5]  26.00-27.00  sec   192 KBytes  1.57 Mbits/sec  
[  5]  27.00-28.00  sec   189 KBytes  1.55 Mbits/sec  
[  5]  28.00-29.00  sec   193 KBytes  1.58 Mbits/sec  
[  5]  29.00-30.00  sec   179 KBytes  1.46 Mbits/sec  
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
[ ID] Interval   Transfer Bitrate Retr
[  5]   0.00-32.20  sec  4.41 MBytes  1.15 Mbits/sec  388 sender
[  5]   0.00-30.00  sec  3.57 MBytes   998 Kbits/sec  receiver

which averaged the overall prescribed "upload" speed, but notice that
it's not 1Mb/s in any kind of a steady stream but rather bursts of
higher than 1Mb/s speed followed by low/no speed.  At one point it was
2 seconds with no transfer at all even.

and here's receiving (i.e. "download"):

[ ID] Interval   Transfer Bitrate Retr  Cwnd
[  5]   0.00-1.35   sec  46.6 KBytes   283 Kbits/sec0   12.9 KBytes   
[  5]   1.35-2.00   sec  0.00 Bytes  0.00 bits/sec0   12.9 KBytes   
[  5]   2.00-3.00   sec  67.3 KBytes   551 Kbits/sec0   37.5 KBytes   
[  5]   3.00-4.00   sec  46.6 KBytes   382 Kbits/sec0   40.1 KBytes   
[  5]   4.00-5.00   sec   105 KBytes   858 Kbits/sec0   44.0 KBytes   
[  5]   5.00-6.00   sec  88.0 KBytes   721 Kbits/sec0   54.3 KBytes   
[  5]   6.00-7.00   sec   141 KBytes  1.16 Mbits/sec0   69.9 KBytes   
[  5]   7.00-8.00   sec   124 KBytes  1.02 Mbits/sec0101 KBytes   
[  5]   8.00-9.00   sec   186 KBytes  1.53 Mbits/sec0146 KBytes   
[  5]   9.00-10.00  sec   248 KBytes  2.04 Mbits/sec0206 KBytes   
[  5]  10.00-11.00  sec   311 KBytes  2.54 Mbits/sec0257 KBytes   
[  5]  11.00-12.00  sec  0.00 Bytes  0.00 bits/sec   43194 KBytes   
[  5]  12.00-13.00  sec  0.00 Bytes  0.00 bits/sec   75199 KBytes   
[  5]  13.00-14.00  sec   435 KBytes  3.56 Mbits/sec0199 KBytes   
[  5]  14.00-15.00  sec  0.00 Bytes  0.00 bits/sec   34114 KBytes   
[  5]  15.00-16.00  sec  0.00 Bytes  0.00 bits/sec   34140 KBytes   
[  5]  16.00-17.00  sec   373 KBytes  3.05 Mbits/sec0149 KBytes   
[  5]  17.00-18.00  sec  0.00 Bytes  0.00 bits/sec0162 KBytes   
[  5]  18.00-19.00  sec   373 KBytes  3.05 Mbits/sec0168 KBytes   
[  5]  19.00-20.00  sec  0.00 Bytes  0.00 bits/sec0171 KBytes   
[