Broadband usage limits... uh what?

[baron8000]

Heres the situation, I'm moving house and am switching from Virgin media (bleh) to Sky broadband (+sky sports, yay)

 

 

 

Now Virgin media is unlimited usage, whilst the Sky package has a usage limit of 40GB and I was hoping the people of tip.it can answer me some questions.

 

 

 

1) what does this relate to?

 

2) will msn messenger "use" this limited amount

 

3) will I be constantly looking at how much I have left?

 

4) what can i avoid to "save" if its possible.

 

 

 

Thanks in advance, moving on tuesday so hurry with answers please!

[blade995]

1) This related to how much you can download from the internet. Webpages, IM conversations are all included in this.

 

 

 

2) If you are just using MSN messenger and viewing webpages it's almost impossible to go over this limit.

 

 

 

3) This all depends if your paranoid about going over. Some ISPs put a cap on your bandwidth but it's usually not enforced (unless you eat up some outrageous amount). I have never used them before so I have no clue if they do this.

 

 

 

4) You shouldn't have to take any precautions to save bandwidth, 40gb is a lot of bandwidth to eat up in just one month. Although don't torrent a lot because that could eat up bandwidth pretty fast.

[baron8000]

^ thanks, I only use my net for msn (will be along way from friends in my new house ), web browsing and RS.

 

 

 

Seeing how I don't download music or anything like that I should be ok? MSN will run quite a lot though :? bloody parents moving right before holz.

[blade995]

^ thanks, I only use my net for msn (will be along way from friends in my new house ), web browsing and RS.

 

 

 

Seeing how I don't download music or anything like that I should be ok? MSN will run quite a lot though :? bloody parents moving right before holz.

 

 

 

Even if you stay on msn 24 hours a day for a whole month you will not use all of it. Your only basically sending text documents which are very small in size.

[Somnambulism]

Most ISPs will charge extra per GB you go over the limit. A stupid price, too - like ÃÆââ¬Å¡Ãâã2/GB at a guess. The bandwidth caps are not normally used for this sort of service - they're normally used in accordance with an 'acceptable use policy' or 'traffic management policy' on an 'unlimited' connection. I put 'unlimited' in quotes because the very existence of this limit means it's a lie.

 

 

 

If you don't download media - music, video, or games - then you have nothing to worry about. Text MSN chatting uses an absolutely negligible amount of bandwidth.

[Doomster]

There is no such thing as "unlimited"...

 

 

 

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2007/05/08 ... hrottling/

 

 

 

40GB per month is pretty generous, actually.

 

 

 

A heavy "general internet" user could probably hit 3GB, downloading and video streaming is what really stokes it up. Audio is a lot lighter, but streaming 256k quality for 8 hours a day, every day would eat 3/4 of the quota - if you do like internet music stations on as a background, then don't use the super-quality stream (you'd often have to pay extra for that anyway).

[dsavi]

There is such thing as unlimited. Our family would have broke the limit by now, being as much internet freaks as we are, downloading huge open-source developing programs, installing Linux over the internet, MSN, YouTube, flash games... All at the same time.

[blade995]

There is such thing as unlimited. Our family would have broke the limit by now, being as much internet freaks as we are, downloading huge open-source developing programs, installing Linux over the internet, MSN, YouTube, flash games... All at the same time.

 

 

 

Everything has a limit. They may say it's unlimited but if your taking away bandwidth from other customers they will disconnect you. They rather have 5 people using 20GBs a month than 1 person using 100GBs a month.

 

 

 

Take Comcast for example, they advertise unlimited but there have been stories of people using 100GBs a month, repeatedly, and being disconnected from it.

 

 

 

You may think your using tons of bandwidth, but your probably not. The way you use the internet is normal, it's the people that take advantage of unlimited and use so much there degrading other peoples speed, then there is a problem.

[Cruiser]

There is such thing as unlimited.

 

 

 

No there isn't. You are always limited by either a bandwidth cap, a capped transfer rate, or both.

 

 

 

Even if they advertised 'unlimited', you are still very limited by the capped speed of the line and there is most likely a hidden cap in the terms of service that they can point to when they decide you're using too much.

[Albosky]

 

Take Comcast for example, they advertise unlimited but there have been stories of people using 100GBs a month, repeatedly, and being disconnected from it.

 

 

 

guess they just haven't caught up with me yet :P

[Hitman247m]

Mine is actually unlimited, despite what some people say.. I use between 70 and 200 gigs of bandwidth per month :wall:

[RebelAssassin]

mine has an apparent 2mb of usage, but i know i spend more than that an di have never been overcharged.

 

 

 

and that is with two providers diffrent.

[no_way2go]

 

Everything has a limit. They may say it's unlimited but if your taking away bandwidth from other customers they will disconnect you. They rather have 5 people using 20GBs a month than 1 person using 100GBs a month.

 

 

 

Take Comcast for example, they advertise unlimited but there have been stories of people using 100GBs a month, repeatedly, and being disconnected from it.

 

 

 

 

 

That's called FUP: Fair Use Policy.

 

It is when you are the cause of slowing down other peoples internet :P

 

 

 

Anyway I got a 12 GB limit and I get round but I DO have to watch what I download and what not... I hope they get rid of them here (Belgium) soon, we are somewhat behind because there are only 2 large companies in my area.