US Cable Support > Comcast HSI > The Bandwidth Limits/Congestion Management Topic

said by C_Chipperson:

Just a reminder, 250GB is pretty much meaningless. Comcast was ordered to provide a number and that's what they said. Many people have reported going above that number without anything being done by Comcast. You have to be on a congested node, and be part of the reason for the congestion, and be one of the heaviest users on Comcast's network in order to be warned, let alone cut off. I wouldn't worry about using 230 or 240.

As far as suggesting that Comcast should allow literally unlimited usage, that is obviously impossible. Some degree of congestion management HAS to be implemented, otherwise none of us would have affordable residential high speed internet service at all.

A T1 line costs several hundred dollars a month for a reason. If you want Comcast to provide you the same access to the internet at a much higher speed and at a much lower cost with unlimited bandwidth, you are being irrational.

said by fonzbear2000:

I agree! Also, we should be VERY glad that Comcast isn't implementing a much lower cap like some other ISP's are doing such as Roadrunner.

said by C_Chipperson:

As far as suggesting that Comcast should allow literally unlimited usage, that is obviously impossible.

said by C_Chipperson:

Comcast was ordered to provide a number and that's what they said.

said by C_Chipperson:

Many people have reported going above that number without anything being done by Comcast.

said by C_Chipperson:

You have to be on a congested node, and be part of the reason for the congestion, and be one of the heaviest users on Comcast's network in order to be warned, let alone cut off.

said by C_Chipperson:

As far as suggesting that Comcast should allow literally unlimited usage, that is obviously impossible. Some degree of congestion management HAS to be implemented, otherwise none of us would have affordable residential high speed internet service at all.

A T1 line costs several hundred dollars a month for a reason. If you want Comcast to provide you the same access to the internet at a much higher speed and at a much lower cost with unlimited bandwidth, you are being irrational.

said by funchords:

Why is it irrational to expect unlimited? Certainly many ISPs cap but many do not. Are Verizon customers irrational for enjoying unlimited service?

said by IPPlanMan:

Is it an ad if it's on the website?

said by espaeth:

If you apply a little bit of logic as to the cost of infrastructure, it's clear why that is.

said by espaeth:

Some people can indeed use their broadband connection in a manner that they feel is unlimited without running into problems; that doesn't mean everyone can. If you apply a little bit of logic as to the cost of infrastructure, it's clear why that is.

said by IPPlanMan:

"Feel"? What do you mean by "feel"? If you mean that the cap, if one exists, is high enough so it's not noticed by the customer or ISP unless he/she streams for 1 month flat out 24/7... is that "feel"?

said by IPPlanMan:

How are Verizon's costs different? Things cost them money too.

said by espaeth:

It is the job of marketing departments to sell product, not to be concerned about being 100% forward and showing the full truth.

said by JohnInSJ:

We've been round this pole before

said by JohnInSJ:

Especially when trying to take away market share from the established, dominant player

I use the living crap out of my 12/2 business class connection. My average usage is between 120 and 150GB/month: »www.schettino.us/monitor/schetti···and.html


Sure, you can use more. But you're a very very very small minority of the overall subscriber base. We've been round this pole before

said by WernerSchutz:

Using "the living crap" is a subjective appraisal.

I believe if there is a cap, it should be clearly stated, as in the speed, in all advertsisements regarding such connection. What is is for, averages, and all that smoke screen is just marketing to compete against a superior product, as FiOS is.

said by WernerSchutz:

The reason nutrition info is displayed was because that was mandated to prevent glossing over or omitting such important harmful data.

That needs to be done regarding to the advertising and the cap.

said by sortofageek:

Where are the McDonald's ads which spell out the nutrition info?

said by sortofageek:

I asked you because you are the one who said Comcast needs to include the cap in their advertising, implying having disclosure in the TOS and elsewhere on their website isn't enough.

You used McDonald's nutrition info as an example, but I have never seen McD ads which spell out nutrition info.

said by fbg :

Using cell phone analogy is phony, as ISP don't charge usage by the minute.

said by WernerSchutz:

I did not say that McDonalds ads show nutrition info, JohninSJ mentioned that one.

said by WernerSchutz:

The reason nutrition info is displayed was because that was mandated to prevent glossing over or omitting such important harmful data.

That needs to be done regarding to the advertising and the cap.

said by sortofageek:

It isn't important enough to me to keep hammering it, but I don't know how else to read what you said here:

The bottom line for me is that Comcast's management of bandwidth doesn't appear to be an issue for more than a handful of people relative to their entire customer base. I know it upsets you and IPPlanMan. I guess I just don't understand why you need to tell us the same thing over such a long period of time.

I mean, I do know you don't like it. I'm just as sorry as I can manage to be over that, but it is well documented here, so I'm not likely to forget and most people have better memory than I do. You're on record. You can stop now until such time there truly is something new to tell us.

said by WernerSchutz:

The reason nutrition info is displayed was because that was mandated to prevent glossing over or omitting such important harmful data.

said by DavisPhotog:

They don't advertise that eating their food makes you fat because it doesn't do that by itself. It requires excessive consumption. Just playing the devil's advocate here.

Comcast seems to be throttling torrent downloads in Oakland, albeit not heavy enough to immediately suspect them as culprits. I find it hard to get more than 100-300kb/sec down on many torrents, whereas my friend on Time Warner consistently gets 1mb/sec down on a comparably-tiered connection.

What gives, Comcast?

said by DavisPhotog:

Comcast seems to be throttling torrent downloads in Oakland, albeit not heavy enough to immediately suspect them as culprits.

said by EG:

Do you have any packet captures such as from the Wireshark application showing spoofed TCP resets to prove it ?

said by DavisPhotog:

I would in fact like to get to the bottom of this. I can't seem to make WireShark work on OS X (it opens, says something about building a font library, and then closes). Can you recommend any alternatives?

said by jlivingood:

Recommendation - start a new thread. Posting a new issue on a 115-page thread is unlikely to result in satisfactory troubleshooting by other users.

said by DavisPhotog:

They don't advertise that eating their food makes you fat because it doesn't do that by itself. It requires excessive consumption. Just playing the devil's advocate here.

said by IPPlanMan:

Excessive consumption...

Don't the higher service speeds themselves contribute to "excessive consumption"?

...

Since the downloads take less time, you'll have a higher consumption...

said by IPPlanMan:

Fact is, the cap is the same for all of the tiers.

said by sortofageek:

Trying to follow your logic, it seems the "you" would have to be a person with a mission to fill time with downloading. That wouldn't be me. Regardless of the speed of my connection, I download only what I actually need. A faster connection just gets the job done faster, so I can get on with life.

But then the existence of cheesecake, which I do love, in abundance does not cause me to eat it in excess, either.

This is another re-hash, BTW.

And yet another repetitive comment. Like it, buy it. If you don't, look for something more appealing to you.

Do you have something actually new to discuss in regard to bandwidth limits?

said by sortofageek:

Trying to follow your logic, it seems the "you" would have to be a person with a mission to fill time with downloading. That wouldn't be me. Regardless of the speed of my connection, I download only what I actually need. A faster connection just gets the job done faster, so I can get on with life.

But then the existence of cheesecake, which I do love, in abundance does not cause me to eat it in excess, either.

This is another re-hash, BTW.

...

And yet another repetitive comment. Like it, buy it. If you don't, look for something more appealing to you.

Do you have something actually new to discuss in regard to bandwidth limits?

said by JohnInSJ:

I use it without regard for any caps (mine are much higher then the non-business class caps, but even so I would not come close to a 250gb cap with extensive use by multiple users) and I am in no way a "typical" home comcast user.

said by sortofageek:

For those with business class accounts, it probably feels unlimited because it is, at least for now.

As documented in first post in this topic:
11-06-09 Business Class Accounts not capped per comcastcares

said by C_Chipperson:

Some degree of congestion management HAS to be implemented, otherwise none of us would have affordable residential high speed internet service at all.