[damurdock]

My family (rural SE US) uses Wildblue (now Exede) satellite internet. It works better than the dial-up alternative surely, but it falls flat in terms of speed, cost, reliability (you must maintain LOS, so rain, tree growth, and sometimes very thick cloud cover will kill it) and latency (~1000ms ping) compared to my mediocre cable plan. There is also a rolling 30-day bandwidth limit. Another common satellite provider is HughesNet, they have similar plans but do data limits differently IIRC. If satellite is your only choice, it's workable, but do check other options.

Another common rural option is a Wireless ISP (WISP), but they have limited coverage so it will entirely depend on where you are. Also check if DSL is available, it's not the most common thing but it can pop up in strange locations.