Satellie

• Satellite communications allow unidirectional and bidirectional communications anywhere there is a line of site to the earth's equator.
• There is a group of satellites about 22,000 miles above the equator in a geosynchronous orbit used for communications.
• If you have a satellite dish, you are pointed to one of these satellites.
• In an unidirectional setup, you can receive video, voice, music, and data, but you cannot send information back.
• Your satellite dish operates in this mode of communication (unidirectional setup).
• The unidirectional setup is also popular for command and control situations where first responders need to only view camera feeds and data such as weather.
• In a bidirectional setup, you can also send data back through the use of a very small aperture terminal (VSAT), which is a dish that can transmit and receive data.

  • There are some issues: such as the transmission distance and the speed of light at about 186,000 miles per second, which is how fast your transmission travels.
• There are four transmission that need to traverse the distance between you and the satellite; then the satellite relays it to the provider, the provider, and the satellite replies back to you.
• Although it is a great technology (bidirectional) for remote locations, the delay can make real-time protocols such as VoIP very difficult.