is Intellian HD dome and KVH TracVision 4 only good for TV ? (not internet ?)

I'm moving the boat to a marina that has no Wi-Fi or cable TV. The boat came with a satellite dome and receiver, but I've never used it and know nothing about it.

The sat dome is an Intellian HD but the control seems to be a KVH TracVision 4. Is there any way this can be used for sat internet or is this for TV only ?

And if so, is that why some boats have two domes...one for TV and the other for internet data ? (and yeah I know often enough the second one is for nothing...a fake just to look cool !)

I can get internet via creating my own "hot spot" on the iPhone....but it's pretty limiting from a gigabyte data limitation perspective....I'd max it out in no time unless I upgraded the capacity to a rather costly situation. Same deal with those stand alone cell data network devices....even 90 bucks a month doesn't get you much data...not enough to even watch one web based movie.

Thoughts ?

Internet via sat would be far more expensive than cellular data plan.

L.

Dune said:

I'm moving the boat to a marina that has no Wi-Fi or cable TV. The boat came with a satellite dome and receiver, but I've never used it and know nothing about it.

The sat dome is an Intellian HD but the control seems to be a KVH TracVision 4. Is there any way this can be used for sat internet or is this for TV only ?

And if so, is that why some boats have two domes...one for TV and the other for internet data ? (and yeah I know often enough the second one is for nothing...a fake just to look cool !)

I can get internet via creating my own "hot spot" on the iPhone....but it's pretty limiting from a gigabyte data limitation perspective....I'd max it out in no time unless I upgraded the capacity to a rather costly situation. Same deal with those stand alone cell data network devices....even 90 bucks a month doesn't get you much data...not enough to even watch one web based movie.

Thoughts ?

Click to expand...

Sometimes, probaby always, the second dome is decorative, an empty shell.

catalinajack said:

Sometimes, probaby always, the second dome is decorative, an empty shell.

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Heck of a sales job. I met a boater this summer and asked about the two domes on his boat. One was tv and the other was decorative. He seemed a little embarrassed to say the second one was to simply provide visual balance. Maybe it was the surprised look on my face, as I had not heard of this before.

catalinajack said:

Sometimes, probaby always, the second dome is decorative, an empty shell.

Click to expand...

There is an echo in here..... didn't I already mention that ?

Here's another echo - you just don't wanna watch web based movies via Sat data!

Almost certainly your dome and controller is TV only. Domes for data are a lot more expensive than the TV ones, and the data charges/plans are usually in MB (and not many, either) rather than gigabytes. You won't want to be using sat data for anything other than emails, and skip the attachments.

And if you by chance do have a fancy data system on board, beware of how its configured. A guy here started downloading two movies via WiFi, but then united from the dock and headed out into the bay. His data system seamlessly switched from WiFi download to Satellite download. He got his movies just fine. He also received a $15,000 satellite data bill later in the month! Needless to say, he now has things configured a bit differently.

Aren't the satellite domes receive only?

I just had to install a new KVH TV3 satellite antenna on our boat shortly after taking ownership. I asked about internet and they said you couldn't get it with the TV antenna. I did have a second "fake" antenna but got rid of it.

A done could also be for a sat phone. The fake dome has been known to smuggle drugs. Lots of uses. LOL

Our land home has satellite internet via Hughes.net, we use it to watch/stream TV all the time....... It's not as fast as a copper wire or fiber optic, but it is acceptable. I don't see why you couldn't access their satellite just as well as Directv's once you had an account.

High speed internet via satellite (vs. satellite phone) requires a very stable platform - more stable than you can get on a boat. This is why you can't use Hughes.net on the boat. The satellite antenna systems do not have the accuracy and stability needed to transmit high speed data back up to the satellite - unless you have a budget the size of the military! Had a friend who wanted to put a Hughes.net antenna on piling in his marina. The FCC technician told him it wasn't allowed, that the piling moved too much (a couple of inches) and that his transmissions might interfere with other data if the dish wasn't steady. Typical receive only satellite TV signals have a beamwidth of +/- 3-4 degrees (in the US) so a little bit of motion is relatively easy to correct with a tracking system. High speed internet is much much less tolerant requiring much more sophisticated (i.e., very expensive) tracking. That makes in commercially not viable.

We have 1 dome, an old KVH M7. Just Direct TV, non high Def. During the boat show we checked into a high Def, $13,500.00 for a new dish! I paid less than 2K for my "old" system.

If you want internet, another dish or there are different way. We use our cell phones with blue tooth to access the internet.

BYW a single dome looks sexy! We call ours "The nipple!"

A friend of mine has an internet satellite antenna on his boat. His monthly bill is $15,000. That is not a typo. He says it’s cheap compared to the cost of crew.

I looked into it. Would cost me $1500 a month. More than I want to spend.

Alaskan Sea-Duction said:

We have 1 dome, an old KVH M7. Just Direct TV, non high Def. During the boat show we checked into a high Def, $13,500.00 for a new dish! I paid less than 2K for my "old" system.

If you want internet, another dish or there are different way. We use our cell phones with blue tooth to access the internet.

BYW a single dome looks sexy! We call ours "The nipple!"

Click to expand...

If one wants HD television, consider Intellian. For about $2,500 and a Dish RV account, one can get the normal Dish program packages including locals wherever one happens to be. Plus, boaters can establish an RV account which is month-to-month and can be suspended ( not camcelled) at will. I did a self-install. KVH is wildly expensive plus getting network stations requires account gymnastics.