Broadband Download Limits

I'm_With_Stupid

Can someone explain these things to me? Say for example, it states a 4GB limit. Is that just 4GB of stuff downloaded from websites, like files save to your computer, or does it include the bandwidth involved in uploading the website itself. Also does it include P2P file downloads? And in each of these cases, when you hit your monthly download limit, what does it do/prevent you from doing? And finally, on your bill, does it generally tell you your usage?

Millionaire

I'm_With_Stupid wrote: »

Can someone explain these things to me? Say for example, it states a 4GB limit. Is that just 4GB of stuff downloaded from websites, like files save to your computer, or does it include the bandwidth involved in uploading the website itself. Also does it include P2P file downloads? And in each of these cases, when you hit your monthly download limit, what does it do/prevent you from doing? And finally, on your bill, does it generally tell you your usage?

Bandwidth Limits includes everthing thats download, including websites, pics, movies, p2p, software etc etc.

Normally compaines give abit of a leway if you are going over your limit, by not that much.

But if it happens constantly by quite a bit they will notify you that next time they will charge you more or request you to move to a higher usage package. all depends on the company providing your broadband.

Some may not even say nothing at all.

I havent personally had my provider tell me how much i use but you can download software that tells ou how much you are using. Net meter i think its called.

Jzpop

In order to view a web page, in essence you download a copy of the page to your PC - therefore a page packed with graphics takes longer to download, as there are more bytes of information to transfer. So yes, viewing web pages means that you are downloading data, and it will count towards your download limit.

Uploading is transferring data from your PC to a web server, FTP site, other P2P users etc. Not too many ISPs worry about the amount of uploading you do (within whatever they consider to 'reasonable limits').

Not many (any?) ISPs will give you a 'usage bill' each month, although some will allow you to check your usage so far on their websites.

What happens if you exceed their limit varies from ISP to ISP. Some will use a 'yellow card' type of system, whereby they warn you that you are approaching / have exceeded your limit.

Others will simply inform you that they have upgraded you (and the cost) to their unlimited price plan.

Read the terms & conditions carefully before you sign up, or simply steer clear of capped price plans.

speranza

..........

JonnyThunder

Yeah, try to get a provider that offers unlimited bandwidth 'out of hours'. Nildram is one such company that give you 50Gb allowance per month, but if you download between 12am and 8am it doesn't count towards your usage.

A few providers offer similar types of deal (although I love Nildram like they are my own children... and some of them probably are...)

pistonbroke

I for one cannot understand the point of limits on Broadband, it's like buying a Ferrari and being told you can only drive it at 100mph for 5 minutes a day.

If you have a Xbox for example, 4GB can be eaten up in a day or two downloading demo's and the like...

There are some good ISP's offering unlimited for under £20 now

Lexis200

The point is that ISPs still have to pay for that bandwidth, just like you pay for your internet connection. They will do things a bit differently though... either buy bandwidth in bulk (and we're talking terabytes of data) or very expensive unlimited pipes to tier1 providers. Either way, bandwidth isn't free for them any more than it's free for us.

And unlimited still isn't unlimited in the true sense of the word... that's why they have Acceptable Use Policies. I'm on Sky BB, and for all intents and purposes it is unlimited. I could (and do sometimes) transfer 5+ gigs a day without problems, but I've heard on other forums that there's an unofficial AUP limit of around 340 gigs per month.

Although I don't get anywhere near that (by a factor of around 10), I could see someone on ADSL2 living next to the exchange and downloading movies all day breaking that quite easily and being penalised as a result.

pistonbroke

I know why they do it, but they never used to when ADSL first came to the UK... Because I need my connection for work I need unlimited and a decent ISP, so I have always been with Pipex

JonnyThunder

The reason for that, is the demand for broadband was a lot less when it was first introduced (remember - most of the country couldn't get a good connection). Also, to stranglehold the technology, BT didn't make use of the fastest hardware they could get. So less demand and slower speeds meant that ISPs didnt have to limit the bandwidth. (They have a habit of doing this - they did the same with ISDN, milking it for everything it's worth)

Now, we're all using faster connections and leaving our machines on overnight to download gigs of useless junk that eventually gets deleted. And like the other guy said earlier, even our ISPs have to pay for their bandwidth.

Lexis200

Pipex is OK, but I can't stand the adverts (maybe it's because I'm not German )
I use Sky BB for work too and it's been very reliable. The only problem I had was the router failing, and that's not really Sky's fault.

Nildram and Zen are the other two "high end" consumer/business ISPs. If Sky goes bad, I'll probably go to one of them.

Lexis200

download gigs of useless junk that eventually gets deleted

Very true... especially newsgroup posts that, even with all the par files, you're still 1 block away from a 4.5 gig download Grrrr:mad: