Hi!! Newbie here..

[anitadeason]

Hello to everyone,

 As stated a newbie to the satellite internet. I currently run my laptop and 3 cells from the wifi.
Coming from way high speed, I do understand that this is not going to be as quick as I had before and I am actually doing pretty good not to compare the two.
Any and all help and suggestions would be awesome. 
Our main thing is browsing the internet and shopping, however I also play Microsoft games that use xbox to sign in, and have a 15yr old that loves Netflix. What are the good things to do to help the speed and keep the data usage from being outrageous??
We started just yesterday with HughesNet and so far I'm not discouraged only except that a few of my Microsoft games wont even open and I cannot access my email. I use aol but have it through the Microsoft acct that came with my laptop {Windows 8} I use Chrome browser also.
If there are more compatible programs please inform me so that I can utilize my HughesNet to the best potential. I have seen many horrible reviews, however I have also seen great reviews as well. Hubby and I have other options, we just chose to give this a try and make the best of what we have. 

Thanks everyone and have a great day.

[BirdDog]

This tells you how to change Netflix streaming definition and note it can take 8 hours for the change to take effect:  https://help.netflix.com/en/node/87

We have no issue with low definition on 32" TV and smaller screens. It starts a bit ugly looking for about the first minute but then looks much better.

Also install an ad blocker on all browsers.

Be careful with that Xbox downloading updates in the background without you knowing.

[anitadeason]

Thanks for the tips on the Netflix and the phones. I have actually advised hubs and dearest daughter NOT to let their phones update at all from the wifi. They can do that at school and work, lol.. Unfortunately, we have other options but none of them are land based. As for the Microsoft games, since I've posted my laptop had installed a Microsoft update overnight and this fixed the problem with them loading, we don't have an xbox, just have to use the log in for the games. I'm very weird about my computers and the amount of items I have on startup and running in the background, so I feel pretty confident that I've minimized any potential unwanted programs sucking the data that way.

Thanks again for the input. Anything else, please let me know.

[anitadeason]

Real quick add on question.
It just hit me that you said right now I have basically unlimited data. I have a desktop that I want to upgrade to Windows 8, so now would be the time to do that?

[Ricky]

Yes, do it now while you have unlimited Internet. It will not count against you data limits now.

[BirdDog]

And I highly recommend going to 8.1, many improvements over 8. Be sure not to install the GWX update either if you don't want Windows 10.

[donsjgm]

Hi Anita,
First let me welcome you to the community.
Everyone here has given you good advice and you appear to be astute when it comes to using/conserving your data.
No one has mentioned latency yet so be aware that it takes time for your computer to reach the satellite in space and return to earth. This makes real-time gaming not something you can do with a satellite internet connection. Also on the subject of gaming, games are quite large in terms of data and it is not practical to download them like you might do with an unlimited data connection.
Best of luck,

Don  🙂

[Amanda]

Hi Anita

I don't think there is much left for to me to say... Everyone here has given you spectacular answers! As you can see, we're all here to lend a hand. I do recommend an Adblocker & if you are interested in music or videos, subscribing to a YouTube Red or like service so you can watch/listen ad-free on all your devices (since normally cellphones dont have an all-over adblocker) and provide the ability to download content to watch offline without having to use your data.

-Amanda