|
Comcast to start bandwidth caps
|
|
The following comments relate to this news article:
article published on 29 August, 2008
Comcast, the United States' largest ISP will begin bandwidth caps for its subscribers beginning October 1st.
The company says users who exceed 250GB of data for a month will receive a warning and then have their service cut off for a year for a second violation.
The usage policy for the ISP has been updated today however the bandwidth cap policy will not begin until October 1st. Making ... [ read the full article ]
Please read the original article before posting your comments.
|
|
joe777
Member
|
29. August 2008 @ 11:50 |
Link to this message
|
|
Double bubble sorry.
This message has been edited since posting. Last time this message was edited on 29. August 2008 @ 11:52
|
|
Advertisement
|
 |
|
|
|
joe777
Member
|
29. August 2008 @ 11:51 |
Link to this message
|
So this is the best comcast can come up with? Ah, I get it now, buy our service, but we will tell you what to do with it.
As the late great Bill Hicks once said " go back to sleep america we have made all the decisions for you" "of course you have the freedom of choice, choose a. b. c."
He he he what is the world becoming eh!!!!
Well I suppose there's always the challenge of, who can max out the bandwidth the quickest, then jump on the neighbours wifi for the rest of the month. Let the games commence.
|
Senior Member
2 product reviews
|
29. August 2008 @ 12:24 |
Link to this message
|
That's fine with me, I am looking at moving to a place that offers Verizon's Fiber-Optic network in the near future anyway.
I am not going to change my habits but I personally have 5 people in my house that means we are almost always on the 'net.
Between this and the occasional 360 gaming I do online I wouldn't be surprised if I hit the cap in a month or two. If I do hit the cap before December than I am going to be switching back to DSL, because unless they recently changed things my DSL provider doesn't do bandwidth caps.
Yes, I know its a month-long thing (the 250GB is per month) but I could see me hitting it pretty easily, considering every bit of data sent or received counts towards the total.
|
AfterDawn Addict
4 product reviews
|
29. August 2008 @ 13:01 |
Link to this message
|
|
250GB is not to bad, but come on guys get with infrastructure building!
|
Senior Member
11 product reviews
|
29. August 2008 @ 13:07 |
Link to this message
|
|
I don't fully believe this. Looking at it logically, a company that requires capital to keep the doors open will not "ban" customers for a year. They may charge you more, but ban you?, I don't think that would happen.
|
Senior Member
|
29. August 2008 @ 13:32 |
Link to this message
|
250 gb is pretty fair compared to Frontier's 5 gb- Blah
No time for Leap frog!!!
|
|
fgamer
Suspended permanently
|
29. August 2008 @ 14:12 |
Link to this message
|
If Time Warner follows suit I don't see how they can advertise people to download movies and shows from HBO on demand online. It just seems like it defeats the purpose of online movie downloading "the so called future." I really think allot of online companies that get a somewhat large part of their income from downloads such as Xbox Live, Netflix or whatever, must worry some when this starts to become the norm and will probably scare customers from making that extra online purchase in fear of going over their limit. I just think all this bandwidth usage talk is not as out of controll as these ISP's want people to think.
|
|
jony218
Suspended due to non-functional email address
|
29. August 2008 @ 14:33 |
Link to this message
|
The "average" people who only download 2-3gb a month should just get dialup, they are paying to much for broadband.
I have cox cable and they supposedly have a 75gb a month limit, I know I download more than that in a month but have never got any warnings.
The problem I have is, why is the customer suppose to keep track of the bandwidth, the customer should be able to log into their internet account and find out immediately how many gb they have left.
|
|
Xenon24
Junior Member
|
29. August 2008 @ 14:35 |
Link to this message
|
So when I play my madden online against someone, games usually last an hour. So is this wasting a lot of bandwidth or its not that much? I don't really know. I mean gaming nowadays is becoming all about online play, this is going to be a bummer. Oh and I read that Time Warner Cable will do a "Fair Access Policy" but they will charge you when you go over your limit they won't ban you. It also stated that current or existing customers will not have the "limit" it will only be for new customers.
|
Member
|
29. August 2008 @ 14:38 |
Link to this message
|
Originally posted by fgamer:
If Time Warner follows suit I don't see how they can advertise people to download movies and shows from HBO on demand online. It just seems like it defeats the purpose of online movie downloading "the so called future." I really think allot of online companies that get a somewhat large part of their income from downloads such as Xbox Live, Netflix or whatever, must worry some when this starts to become the norm and will probably scare customers from making that extra online purchase in fear of going over their limit. I just think all this bandwidth usage talk is not as out of controll as these ISP's want people to think.
Trust me Time Warner will bypass this crap there losing customers at a rapid pace to Direct TV.Time Warner trying there best now to bring customer back & this will be the last thing they do to piss people off.
|
|
lxfactor
Senior Member
|
29. August 2008 @ 14:55 |
Link to this message
|
|
AT&T 6.0 is gonna spike
|
Senior Member
|
29. August 2008 @ 15:05 |
Link to this message
|
Gee, where to start?
First of all, it's Comcast, the crapola of the net. Everyone knows it and the only people using them are people who have no choice.
Second, while 250GB is quite substantial (realistically it should be WAY more than enough for virtually everyone, even hard core users at the momment) it sets a VERY BAD precident. The precident? That "Unlimited" can be "limited".
They should be forced to sell their service as "250GB Per Month" and not "Unlimited". Also, with this new cap they should be able to take the bad with the good. That is, if I am paying for 250GB/month then I damn well be able to get all 250GB doing anything I wish. Which means there better not be any more of that Torrent throttling. And they better remove the "server" limitations as well. Bandwidth is Bandwidth. It's my 250GB to use as I see fit, (legally, of course).
Some further issues: At what point will the large media providers like Netflix, Itunes, or YouTube and other "high bandwidth" companies start to complain about this type of stuff. These limitations will affect their bottom line and ultimately even disrupt their service. Consider PSP live. They could end up being restricted by this artificial limit when developing games in the future.
This kind of thing could really open the door for more agressive ISP's as well.
Imagine...
"Tired of being restricted by your ISP? Join us for TRUE unlimited Bandwidth..." Ect...
This is a loser move for Comcast. Like I said, the only people using Comcast are those with no choice. ANYONE could move in on them and replace them with little or no effort.
|
Staff Member
4 product reviews
|
29. August 2008 @ 15:11 |
Link to this message
|
Originally posted by ThePastor:
This is a loser move for Comcast. Like I said, the only people using Comcast are those with no choice. ANYONE could move in on them and replace them with little or no effort.
As Zippy always says, all that other company needs is the infrastructure.
|
|
ooZEROoo
Senior Member
4 product reviews
|
29. August 2008 @ 15:26 |
Link to this message
|
I'm a comcast customer. I hate them, but 250 gig is a lot. Some ISPs use a cap of like 30 gig a month. I download torrents, play PS3 online, download software that the college I attend gives me, and I have yet to hit 250 in one month. Now that the FCC has ruled my torrents haven't been getting throttled anymore.
|
|
Y_Eater
Newbie
|
29. August 2008 @ 16:00 |
Link to this message
|
I was disconnected from comcast for exceeding this limit. This cap only applies to residential at least. I had service reconnected in someone else's name with business class. Had to sign a 3 year contract but the price is pretty much the same without having to pay the modem rental. 250gig isnt hard to reach when you are backing up the internet onto dvd-rs
|
|
casemodd
Newbie
|
29. August 2008 @ 17:48 |
Link to this message
|
Originally posted by Y_Eater:
I was disconnected from comcast for exceeding this limit. This cap only applies to residential at least. I had service reconnected in someone else's name with business class. Had to sign a 3 year contract but the price is pretty much the same without having to pay the modem rental. 250gig isnt hard to reach when you are backing up the internet onto dvd-rs
Yes your right 250GB is nothing when you backup to dvds alot. I pay $65 for my net & it better be unlimited otherwise i will drop and switch to dsl,hookup a dual wan & download non stop. I monitor my internet this month alone im chewing near 300GB with usenet :)
|
Senior Member
4 product reviews
|
29. August 2008 @ 17:51 |
Link to this message
|
|
Caps are Caps they all do the same thing, allow marketing income. what is the difference between the 39.99 dollar plan and the 120.00 dollar one. the answers easy no caps people that only can get comcast and run servers are getting screwed up the ass with the wrong end of the proverbial plunger.
as soon as something else hits my area im switching, until then ill just keep getting the plunger.
|
|
Dat1boi
Junior Member
|
29. August 2008 @ 20:20 |
Link to this message
|
|
I personally am ok with this, that is because I would rather they allow me download at speeds that are not throttled, reach my 250gig cap in 3 days and call it a day vs. getting slow download speeds and I get 10 gigs downloaded by the end of the month.
Obviously thats an exaggeration and I still F'n hate comcast, but 250 gig is a decent amount if they let you download at full speeds.
|
Junior Member
|
29. August 2008 @ 21:05 |
Link to this message
|
|
...And to think in Australia they call 3gig a month 'generous'.
...and 'unlimited' is 10gig.
It might suck for some of you but look at other countries and the 250gig seems like alot.
|
Senior Member
|
29. August 2008 @ 21:32 |
Link to this message
|
|
I think if they advertise as unlimited it should be unlimited as ThePastor pointed out.I consider it false advertisement if caps are brought into the picture.Its true you get what you pay for,but the prices are not cheap for services in some areas.I think some of you may get a monthly payment of 39.99 ,but that isn't necessarily the set price everywhere.I don't use ComCast or have the ability to get cable or dsl in my area,but if I could I would make sure its unlimited and not limited to use as I please.It seems as if ComCast is trying to find a way to screw customers over with additional charges for service that should be provided anyway.
...........................:SiG cReAtEd By Phantom69:............................ |
|
B33rdrnkr
Newbie
2 product reviews
|
29. August 2008 @ 22:38 |
Link to this message
|
|
does this mean that I can d/l 250 gigs and u/l unlimited, or is the cap monitoring both? I do not understand....
|
|
novicebb
Member
|
29. August 2008 @ 23:16 |
Link to this message
|
ThePastor:
Man you make somd really great points. IF there is a 250gb cap many people will say they can download whatever they won't and shouldn't have their bandwidth throttled.
But you will also start hearing rumblings from customers that use way less then 250gb to get some type of discount on their service as well.
But I understand many people believe 250gb is way more then enough for most people and this maybe true. But how many of us are very close to that limit though without realizing?
Websites are very flash heavy right now. I mean if you download a few albums a week from Itunes, play COD4 on your Xbox hours a day and like many americans now a days, You spend hours a day online you could easily get close to that limit.
|
|
piloting1
Newbie
|
29. August 2008 @ 23:38 |
Link to this message
|
|
Weather 250gigs will be exceeded is irrelavent. treating customers that pay them with this crap is a sure way to lose money. I know i will do everything i can to find a different service. Its the principal of the thing. Besides, you wait and see this is just another way to bleed people for more money.
|
AfterDawn Addict
16 product reviews
|
30. August 2008 @ 07:32 |
Link to this message
|
Well, that 250GB will be enought for most of the "normal" user so can't say its too little.
And for those not so normal net users... Guess there are other ISP that can give the bandwidth needed.
|
|
Advertisement
|
|
|
|
susieqbbb
Suspended permanently
|
30. August 2008 @ 08:04 |
Link to this message
|
|
250 gig's that is a lot and even if you use torrents you need to notice that this is per month.
250 gig per month that is a lot when i have seen satelite internet access caps at 1 gig worth of downloads per month.
|
