Satellite countries had more room for maneuver in both internal and external affairs especially after the death of Stalin. Until then, we can consider all eastern countries(except Yugoslavia and to an extent Albania) as the purest form of satellites where the orders from Moscow were followed without to much questions.

Having said this, I will give some examples in internal or external affairs where the states had different approaches than the soviet republics.

In foreign policy, the soviet republics had no say on their own, although some of them were UN members(Ukraine for example). The countries took sometimes different approaches: Albania broke with Moscow, Romania condemned the invasion of Czechoslovakia and had good relations with China after the sino-soviet split. While the USSR of the late 80's warmed it's relations with the West, Romania did the opposite.

Internal affaires. While no country had the possibility to change it's economic system(that was the case for the western countries regarding capitalism and USA's action when they thought that something like that could happen), the countries had more to say on how they choose their economic policy compared with the SR's. In the early 60's, the soviets came up with the Valev economic plan which gave every eastern country a "role". Romania's role was to become a mainly agrarian nation with some industry. They rejected the plan and pursued a policy of industrialization. Ukraine, for example, could not have refused a plan that came from Moscow. The Gulash communism of Kadar was not necessarily an order from Moscow, but a reaction to the 1956 revolution.

Regarding the easing of state surveillance and oppression, the policies of the USSR and the countries were similar. After 1953 you do not have the stalinist oppression, even after 1956 or 68. An outsider in the latter years is Romania where the oppression and the Securitate's(the secret police) grew while in the Gorbachev years it was eased. No soviet republic could run contrary with Moscow's policy here.

One last, important thing. All this different approaches of the countries in the east that I mentioned were done if not with Moscow's approval, at lest it was tolerated by them. Every time when USSR believed that the communist system is in danger in one of those countries, they invaded. Similar to the approach done by USA in Latin America. Even Romania's foreign policy moves that were seen as a rebellion by the West were not considered dangerous for the system in the country or the red block as a whole. This is why we were never invaded. Czechoslovakia and Hungary wanted to change the system(freedom of speech, multiple parties, leaving the Warsaw Pact in case of Hungary).

It is safe to say that the eastern countries had more autonomy that the republic which in important, country wide problems did not had.