Comcast 1TB data cap stinks

[SKORPI0]

The 1024GB limit started Aug. 1 in the Chicago area. 2048GB would have been better.

https://customer.xfinity.com/MyServices/Internet/UsageMeter

 

[Aikouka]

link......

http://arstechnica.com/business/201...p-is-business-policy-not-technical-necessity/

 

[Red Squirrel]

data caps are bullshit. they are simply easy gravy for ISPs to get, as long as people are willing to put up with them. we shouldn't even have them on phones, but because phones were generally introduced that way, people have accepted it.

For cell at least there's some reason for it, as RF bandwidth is essentially a shared resource, kinda like if all the phones are on a hub. That said, the current caps on cellular are ridiculous. They should be in the 100's of GB, not MB. Though really they could easily just offer unlimited but just have some kind of global throttle as the tower gets too busy. Voice and texts should have priority over actual data, so when it starts to get congested data would start to either cut out completely or just go to really slow speeds. People might complain that FB is slow, but it's better than getting a bill for like $250,000 because some rogue app you were not aware of decided to start chewing bandwidth while you sleep. Of course, they rather just start a $$$ counter and rack in the big bucks. you get 1 freebie if you mess up, but after that 1 freebie... you're screwed.

 

[Aikouka]

For cell at least there's some reason for it, as RF bandwidth is essentially a shared resource, kinda like if all the phones are on a hub. That said, the current caps on cellular are ridiculous. They should be in the 100's of GB, not MB. Though really they could easily just offer unlimited but just have some kind of global throttle as the tower gets too busy. Voice and texts should have priority over actual data, so when it starts to get congested data would start to either cut out completely or just go to really slow speeds. People might complain that FB is slow, but it's better than getting a bill for like $250,000 because some rogue app you were not aware of decided to start chewing bandwidth while you sleep.

I like T-Mobile's approach where they'll zero-rate video data as long as it's at a certain resolution (it also has to be approved on a per-provider basis). Honestly, I already watch YouTube videos and such at "360p" when I'm on mobile, so doing that and not having it count against me wouldn't be any worse.

 

[Gingerbread Man]

You have obviously said this in jest, but would someone care to educate a non american why this is funny?
Are Comcast the only ISP available or the only ones offering a reliable/fast service?

Other reply is incorrect. The infrastructure delivering wires to your homes are owned either by a single company or by the government. In America, this is usually as simple as a telephone pole. In unregulated areas (laws vary widely from state to state), companies tend not to let competitors run cable on their poles or the phone company owns it and signed an exclusive contract to one provider. In regulated or government owned areas (frequently the case in cities), most governments only allow a single bidder to use the infrastructure for a contract period, usually regulated by law (designed to award contracts to the company that provides the best benefit to the citizens and give the government some control over how they behave...in theory, real life is different). This creates monopolies by geography. Many governments require the property owner to allow competitors to use their poles, but the owner can set a "reasonable" lease fee that jacks up the price of the competitor making it unfeasible to compete. That's why you'll usually see someone list one cable provider and then satellite as their option. Some people have a second option aside from their cable TV company due to phone companies providing service (because they already had infrastructure to get a wire into your home) but it depends on whether or not your phone company chooses to build out their internet capability in your neighborhood (America is pretty spread out as compared to Europe, so cost/benefit isn't always there). I work in the government so I've seen the contracts ;-)

 

[[DHT]Osiris]

Holy cow, that's all? Talk about over compression! I always like to compare 1080p24 of Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer. Movie is only ~90 minutes and required a BD50 (that's a 50GB disk) to record compared to the first movie, which was long and published on a BD25 disk. I cannot imagine how blind I would have to be to accept 6GB for a 2 hour 1080P movie. Well, unless it is 2 hours of 1080P of a black screen.

Yeah, they use pretty heavy compression. I mean, it can still be 'good' quality, most good quality torrents you find @1080P are around the same size. Bear in mind that the blu-ray disks tend to come with a handful of different audio tracks, special features, commentary garbage, behind the scenes stuff, etc. That can eat up a bunch of extra space pretty quickly. I'd say 12GB is about the most you'd need in a raw format to actually get proper 1080P with a single audio track, but Netflix does have bandwidth to consider so 1/2 compression seems okay.

Sharing windows folders and copying particular \steamapps might be a solution.

That can work, but bear in mind steam tends to have a mind of its own when it comes to what data it accepts. If you move the data over and tell steam to 'install' over the top of the directory (to activate it proper), sometimes it'll redownload anywhere from 0-100% of the files, based on whatever reasoning it comes up with. I've done this more than a few times with varying results.

In your example that's 120 movies a month, and 240 hours of watching. Dunno, seems like that's stretching pretty far, and in your example you could fit another 40 movies in and still be under the cap.

Yeah, it was an obtuse example but not completely off-base, especially for 5 people. Do you not know people who just put on movies/tv shows in the background while doing whatever? I know I always did growing up with homework, or while playing games or whatever. Not hard to have a second screen with whatever Netflix playlist on autoplay (that's what the GF and I do, much of our crap is downloaded though and we don't have a cap, thankfully).

 

[sourceninja]

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