Satellites in geostationary Earth orbit (GEO) operate in a fixed position 35,786 km (22,236 miles) above the Earth's equator. At the speed of light (about 300,000 km/s or 186,000 miles per second), it takes a quarter of a second for a radio signal to travel from the Earth to the satellite and back. When other switching and routing delays are added and the delays are doubled to allow for a full round-trip transmission, the total delay can be 0.75 to 1.25 seconds. This latency is large when compared to other forms of Internet access with typical latencies that range from 0.015 to 0.2 seconds. Long latencies negatively affect some applications that require real-time response, particularly online games, voice over IP, and remote control devices. TCP tuning and TCP acceleration techniques can mitigate some of these problems. GEO satellites do not cover the Earth's polar regions. HughesNet, Exede, AT&T and Dish Network have GEO systems.