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JohnInSJ
Premium Member
join:2003-09-22
Aptos, CA

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Re: What happens if I go over 250GB bandwidth use?

said by macspeed:

So now which of the many internet driven services we have do I get rid of?
None. You will have to pay for business class, the Comcast "much higher cap with much higher cost" service.

1990 traffic limits. That's funny. In 1990, you would be using a dial up modem, and you would be paying a LOT more for a trickle of bandwidth.

Oh, and once again to clear up this recurring misconception - the cap has to do with backhaul costs, not congestion. Broadband is PRICED as if you use a very small % of your potential capacity. If it was priced as if you used 100% of your capacity you would be paying 100X what you are now - just price out a T1 line if you think I'm wrong.

beachintech
There's sand in my tool bag
Premium Member
join:2008-01-06

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said by macspeed:

So now which of the many internet driven services we have do I get rid of? What business is going to lose my service now since Comcast wants to push 1990 traffic limits?
You need a business connection if your family really uses that much traffic. I have 3 Roku boxes and 5 PC's in my house and I use less than half of what you do in a normal month and we watch them all quite a bit.

SpaethCo
Digital Plumber
MVM
join:2001-04-21
Minneapolis, MN

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said by macspeed:

Also for the second time in six years we had a drive failure which ate our entire iTunes library. Over 500GB worth of music, movies, TV shows and iPhone apps went "poof". Also for the second time, apple was kind enough to set us up with a download of all that bought and paid for, licensed content.
Why not make a local backup? 1TB USB drives can be had for $150 or less -- seems like reasonably cheap insurance to protect your stuff and not have to worry about haggling with Apple to download everything all over again. Drive failure is a question of when, not if.
said by macspeed:

I pay for the "premium" internet service, "premium" HD cable and DVRs. I really, really can't see where comcast is losing money on my service.
This simply sounds like a matter of not being subscribed to the appropriate plan. Sign up for a business HSI account for a few bucks more and be exempt from the cap.

IPPlanMan
Holy Cable Modem Batman
join:2000-09-20
Washington, DC

IPPlanMan

Member

This guy was using the hell out of his connection and I sure as heck couldn't tell. I doubt that any of us could. But I guess it set some metric off at Comcast....

So it's not really about a negative effect on network performance is it?
IPPlanMan

IPPlanMan to JohnInSJ

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Backhaul costs? Tell me where Comcast comes out and says that.

I only see language about a "high quality experience".

»customer.comcast.com/Pag ··· approach

We're also supposed to accept that somehow Comcast's whole business model is unprofitable and it's necessary to boot a customer for a year if someone hits 251GB of use? As if the hordes of "email checkers" don't make up for that? Please....

Sunny
Runs from Clowns

join:2001-08-19

1 edit

Sunny

The reports we've seen here since Comcast put that 250GB number out there have indicated people who get booted have that happen at consumption levels far higher than your 251GB example.

Reported warnings/disconnects for exceeding cap

»Warned for exceeding the cap, used 715G last month
»Got the call. We used 610GB on a 50mbit/10mbit d3 connection
»Account cut off at 250G? Correction: 715G
»I got a warning from Comcast
»So, has anyone gone over the cap?
»Anyone got letter from Comcast ...
»I got the call ... 680G last month
»Got the call, 850G this month
»50/10 - Just got banned.
»When do I get the call or will I?
»Comcast banned me today 2nd warning 680 GB
»Got the letter for exceeding 250GB/month
»I got the call ... 750GB
»Got the call, 750gb last month
»Service cancelled
»After shut off, allowed to get business class with no hassles
»Got the call, 800GB

SpaethCo
Digital Plumber
MVM
join:2001-04-21
Minneapolis, MN

1 recommendation

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said by IPPlanMan:

This guy was using the hell out of his connection and I sure as heck couldn't tell.
According to your respective profiles, you are in Wash DC, and he is in Texas. I bet you also cannot tell when his utility power dips on hot summer days. Considering congestion is typically only a local condition, you'd only be able to tell if you were in his same neighborhood fed from the same CMTS channels.
said by IPPlanMan:

So it's not really about a negative effect on network performance is it?
It's about subscribing to the appropriate level of service.

Going to use under 250GB -- pick any of the residential plans.
Going to use over 250GB -- pick a business plan.

Business plans start at $60/mo, so it's not like the costs are unreasonable.
Expand your moderator at work

IPPlanMan
Holy Cable Modem Batman
join:2000-09-20
Washington, DC

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Re: What happens if I go over 250GB bandwidth use?

What's the congestion management system for again?

Family of 4... it must be a business!

beachintech
There's sand in my tool bag
Premium Member
join:2008-01-06

beachintech

Premium Member

said by IPPlanMan:

Family of 4... it must be a business!
Most families of 4 don't use anywhere near that much bandwidth out there in the non DSLR world

JohnInSJ
Premium Member
join:2003-09-22
Aptos, CA

JohnInSJ

Premium Member

said by beachintech:

said by IPPlanMan:

Family of 4... it must be a business!
Most families of 4 don't use anywhere near that much bandwidth out there in the non DSLR world
Hell, I AM a business (on 12/2 business class), and I can't even manage to crack 200GB

Don't get hung up on the classification IPPlanMan. This of it as the "Higher Use" paln if that works better for you.

macspeed
join:2010-04-05
Montgomery, TX

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I wasn't aware the business plans had changed to reflect the higher speeds. The 22/5 looks nice but unfortunately in my area the top speed available is the 16/2 (same as my residential but double the price).

Of course the website lists the 22/5 as being 99 per month which is what I'm being charged for the 16/2 - maybe by the end of the year we'll actually get what we're paying for?

We do run a website (hosted on a dedicated service, not from here) so I have no issue paying for the business service, especially if the bandwidth we're using requires it.

Before people jump to conclusions about other people's internet use they should compare the amount of time they spend at home, IMO. We home school both of our kids (online classes through a state program w/ live audio and video), I retired at 40 and my wife is a full time Mom / school teacher so we're here using our service almost 24/7. I worked as a network and systems architect for 20+ years so when I say no one is running rampant P2P on this connection I know this for sure.

As I said, if 99 percent of the customer base isn't even using 250GB p/m then the other 1 percent is not creating an issue. Only the few who are serving content 24/7 on their upstream might even possibly create a problem and we absolutely do not fit that description.
thor793
join:2005-09-10
Schaumburg, IL

thor793

Member

While the people doing p2p and uploading just as much data as they download will reach their caps faster, they are definitely not the only ones who will fall in that "1%". With the speed tiers Comcast has today it's incredibly easy to reach that cap on download alone.

JohnInSJ
Premium Member
join:2003-09-22
Aptos, CA

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said by macspeed:

As I said, if 99 percent of the customer base isn't even using 250GB p/m then the other 1 percent is not creating an issue.
It's not a CAPACITY issue... It's not a CAPACITY issue... It's not a CAPACITY issue...

(pause)

It's STILL not a CAPACITY issue...

The product is PRICED as if on average the total use across all subscribes is well below 250GB.

Bottom line, if your normal usage pattern for your network connection mandates that you consume more then 250GB, then get yourself set up with a business plan.
dogchainx
join:2002-10-09
Providence, UT

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Went over by 20GB, Comcast meter said 272GB for March. No call. Though I DID receive a call about a year ago for 454GB. LOL

spike010101
Premium Member
join:2003-11-28
Austin, TX

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I might as well ditch comcast and use my iPhone's 3G connection since it's "unlimited" of course lol

I don't see how AT&T can come after you if they don't officially even support tethering on the iPhone . "sorry I have no idea what you're on about and neither do you".

macspeed
join:2010-04-05
Montgomery, TX

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I just found out that backblaze had transferred over 2TB of data in the past 2 months. Now I know why our usage was so high.

(If you set up backblaze on defaults it will perform continuous backup, I added my external drive but didn't think it would actually be able to back up that much data that quickly. I have to admit being happy it was able to do so despite the consequences with comcast security).

As for the "it's not capacity" crowd then please explain exactly what the issue is. Having designed a lot of the WANs that carry data let me fill you in on a little secret - network bandwidth is the biggest scam in business.
Once the infrastructure is paid for the entire cost is electricity and personnel plus the occasional hardware upgrade. It does not cost anything to push packets down or up a pipe in reality. US taxpayers paid for that infrastructure in the huge tax breaks given to the telecom companies and those companies have failed completely to live up to their end of the deal.

This "holier than though" position taken on behest of companies like Comcast is a joke. The cost of bandwidth is whatever "they" decide to make it. ("They" being the top tier companies who own the pipes). Just as Comcast should set a use limit based on real world "use" the top tier companies should set rates making those limits profitable.

Thanks to the HD switch we have metric tons of available spectrum to use for added bandwidth and there's more dark fiber in America that you want to know about. There's no excuse for not having top level speed and capacity other than corporate greed. Artificial product and artificial pricing - period.

Now that I'm paying for a business account vs. residential for double the cost will the pipe magically get wider? Will Comcast become more profitable? I guess business bandwidth isn't sold at the same "let's hope they don't actually use it" business model......

IPPlanMan
Holy Cable Modem Batman
join:2000-09-20
Washington, DC

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said by THZNDUP:

You did bring up a valid point though, what would Comcast say if 95-99% of your usage was for Xfinity content, etc and that you never left the HSI World of More?
They'd probably say "thanks for not giving anyone else like Netflix/Vudu/iTunes business"...

Or they'd probably say: "See, you don't need anyone else but us!"

What do you think?

THZNDUP
Deorum Offensa Diis Curae
Premium Member
join:2003-09-18
Lard

THZNDUP

Premium Member

said by IPPlanMan:
said by THZNDUP:

You did bring up a valid point though, what would Comcast say if 95-99% of your usage was for Xfinity content, etc and that you never left the HSI World of More?
They'd probably say "thanks for not giving anyone else like Netflix/Vudu/iTunes business"...

Or they'd probably say: "See, you don't need anyone else but us!"

What do you think?
Ummmmm, I'll take what's behind door number three.........

I'd guess that you would still get the 'bandwidth hog' speech and warning. Also a good story for the watercooler at the call center, 'This guy told me that his 800GB last month was only on Comcast Xfinity.'

Then again one may just have a chance if one got hold of the marketing group for 'Xfinity' and gushed about how great it was etc. and then happened to mention this little problem that the retention group couldn't help you with........

SpaethCo
Digital Plumber
MVM
join:2001-04-21
Minneapolis, MN

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said by macspeed:

As for the "it's not capacity" crowd then please explain exactly what the issue is. Having designed a lot of the WANs that carry data let me fill you in on a little secret - network bandwidth is the biggest scam in business.
Once the infrastructure is paid for the entire cost is electricity and personnel plus the occasional hardware upgrade. It does not cost anything to push packets down or up a pipe in reality.
If usage never increased after a network was deployed, then this would have some merit. The reality is that pretty much any large scale network is constantly being upgraded / expanded /optimized / or modified in some way. There is also always some component of cost because infrastructure hardware has a depreciation schedule so the costs are broken out over several years, usually corresponding to equipment refresh cycles.

In the case of residential DOCSIS access, deployments have been upgraded from 1000-1200 end points sharing a single downstream channel at the start of the decade to approximately 250 end points sharing a downstream channel today. This is a bigger deal than it would appear on the surface because subscriber densities have also increased dramatically over the last decade. Where a single channel could potentially serve an entire city in 2000, in 2010 that channel might only serve a single housing development.
said by macspeed:

Thanks to the HD switch we have metric tons of available spectrum to use for added bandwidth and there's more dark fiber in America that you want to know about.
When you say "HD switch" I'm assuming you mean the DTV conversion, and that has absolutely nothing to do with residential broadband capacity at this time. Comcast is running what they call Project Cavalry which is the full conversion from analog to digital video (not all HD) by deploying an army of digital tuning adapters (DTAs), but that project has a long way to go before the spectrum will be available.

Also, all the fiber in the world doesn't help you if it's not in the right location. The surface of the planet is 97% water and yet we still face issues of drought in numerous regions of the world. Getting the resources to specific locations (ie, your house) is a vastly different scenario than looking at aggregate capacity.
said by macspeed:

There's no excuse for not having top level speed and capacity other than corporate greed. Artificial product and artificial pricing - period.
Profit is a key reason that businesses exist; they are providing a service with the end goal of making money. Just like you wouldn't show up to work if you weren't getting paid, companies have no motivation to offer any service if they don't make money doing it.

With regard to capacity, a 38mbps DOCSIS channel is only going to be able to move a total of 12,312GB over the course of a month. The current cost model works with approximately 250 subscribers sharing a downstream segment, so certain provisions need to be taken to prevent a tragedy of the commons type situation. Obviously the situation improves in DOCSIS 3 markets where 4 channels can be used to augment capacity, but still there needs to be some partitioning of the capacity.
said by macspeed:

Now that I'm paying for a business account vs. residential for double the cost will the pipe magically get wider?
Like all large IT organizations, Comcast most certainly has planline budgets for infrastructure expansion. Decisions on where to spend money usually come down to functions of need and cost recovery intervals. ie, if you have massive subscriber growth in an area it's easy to justify node splits or other upgrades because the additional revenue coming in from the subscriber growth reduces the cost recovery interval. You create a similar situation with business services in that the operating margins for the product are higher, so it's easier to justify upgrades on network segments with business customers vs a single residential account with high usage.

All of this gets away from the simple reality of the situation:

If you're using less than 250GB -- stick with a residential account
If you're using more than 250GB -- switch to a business account

No matter how many times this argument gets rehashed and debated, ultimately that's still what it's all going to boil down to. Sign up for and pay for the level of service you require.

JohnInSJ
Premium Member
join:2003-09-22
Aptos, CA

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said by macspeed:

Now that I'm paying for a business account vs. residential for double the cost will the pipe magically get wider?
No, you'll be paying a rate that assumes you will consume more of the pipe.

Although I expect you will ignore what he posted, espaeth covered everything else just fine except for the point that comcast actually has to pay other companies for backhaul - they DO NOT have a nationwide data network.

every byte they send over the peered network costs them something. It may be a tiny fraction of a penny, but it's NOT 0.

So, you sending 1TB of data costs them 4 times as much as someone sending 250GB of data, and costs then 100-200 times as much as their average 5-10GB/mo customer. Which blows the cost model for everyone.

Do you understand that?
AVonGauss
Premium Member
join:2007-11-01
Boynton Beach, FL

1 edit

AVonGauss

Premium Member

said by JohnInSJ:

Although I expect you will ignore what he posted, espaeth covered everything else just fine except for the point that comcast actually has to pay other companies for backhaul - they DO NOT have a nationwide data network.

every byte they send over the peered network costs them something. It may be a tiny fraction of a penny, but it's NOT 0.
I guess we could split hairs about the definition of a national network, but I believe stating that they do not have a national network would be a bit incorrect. I know Comcast does sell transit and has many different direct peering arrangements, several of which I use on a daily basis. Comcast I don't believe publishes anything regarding their peering arrangement agreements, but considering a vast majority of their core business involves data transit, I would imagine quite a few of those agreements are favorable to Comcast. I still wish Comcast would release some type of network topology map, I think people would be surprised at the level and scope it has reached over the years.
AVonGauss

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said by SpaethCo:

Also, all the fiber in the world doesn't help you if it's not in the right location. The surface of the planet is 97% water and yet we still face issues of drought in numerous regions of the world. Getting the resources to specific locations (ie, your house) is a vastly different scenario than looking at aggregate capacity.
I like the analogy, but isn't it more like 71% of the planet surface is covered by water with 3% of that being fresh water and the rest salt water?

SpaethCo
Digital Plumber
MVM
join:2001-04-21
Minneapolis, MN

SpaethCo

MVM

said by AVonGauss:

I like the analogy, but isn't it more like 71% of the planet surface is covered by water with 3% of that being fresh water and the rest salt water?
It's more like 71% if you're not writing at 2:30am -- sure.

Still the ratio of fresh:salt water is also pretty analogous to the quantity of fiber capacity available in the US in relation to fiber that can be converted into use by end-users.

If you want fiber between the 511 building in Minneapolis and the Chicago Board of Trade building -- no problem, you can pretty much have as much as you want.

You want fiber from Bloomington, MN to Arlington Heights, IL -- be prepared for 7 figures worth of labor + materials expense.

JohnInSJ
Premium Member
join:2003-09-22
Aptos, CA

JohnInSJ to AVonGauss

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said by AVonGauss:

I believe stating that they do not have a national network would be a bit incorrect.
Just traceroute anywhere that isn't local to you, and you will see the peers that are used.

For anything outside of the bay area, my bits leave comcast's network even to go down to LA. That's not free to comcast.
AVonGauss
Premium Member
join:2007-11-01
Boynton Beach, FL

1 edit

AVonGauss

Premium Member

Looking through one endpoint rarely gives a complete picture of a network and it entirely depends on your destination.

Some direct transit sites that I am aware of:

theplanet.com
rackspace.com
fdcservers.net

There are quite a few other locations if you do a bit of searching. Whether its the ISPs own network or a third party, there is always a cost involved, it is only a matter of how much.

Added (a picture of sorts):
Traceroute to theplanet.com (70.87.6.117), 30 hops max, 40 byte packets using ICMP
1 c-76-108-64-1.hsd1.fl.comcast.net (76.108.64.1) 7.341 ms 8.971 ms 8.873 ms
2 ge-1-1-ur01.boynton.fl.pompano.comcast.net (68.85.230.145) 7.832 ms 7.016 ms 8.620 ms
3 te-8-1-ur01.lakeworth.fl.pompano.comcast.net (68.86.165.174) 8.542 ms 7.714 ms 9.651 ms
4 te-8-2-ur02.lakeworth.fl.pompano.comcast.net (68.86.165.178) 9.574 ms 9.682 ms 8.667 ms
5 te-9-1-ur02.staterd7.fl.pompano.comcast.net (68.86.165.101) 8.397 ms 8.370 ms 10.167 ms
6 te-0-12-0-4-ar03.pompanobeach.fl.pompano.comcast.net (68.86.165.106) 10.616 ms 11.090 ms 9.884 ms
7 pos-0-7-0-0-ar03.northdade.fl.pompano.comcast.net (68.86.164.5) 9.884 ms 12.475 ms 12.338 ms
8 pos-0-5-0-0-cr01.miami.fl.ibone.comcast.net (68.86.91.81) 12.502 ms 11.440 ms 13.450 ms
9 pos-2-3-0-0-cr01.atlanta.ga.ibone.comcast.net (68.86.85.193) 27.222 ms 27.117 ms 27.205 ms
10 pos-1-10-0-0-cr01.dallas.tx.ibone.comcast.net (68.86.86.129) 44.945 ms 47.933 ms 48.173 ms
11 pos-0-1-0-0-pe01.1950stemmons.tx.ibone.comcast.net (68.86.86.94) 49.133 ms 49.158 ms 48.066 ms
12 theplanet-cr01.dallas.tx.ibone.comcast.net (75.149.228.2) 45.731 ms 47.692 ms 48.517 ms
13 po13.dsr03.dllstx3.theplanet.com (70.87.253.102) 47.594 ms 46.667 ms 47.346 ms
14 vl1.dsr03.dllstx3.theplanet.com (70.85.125.129) 47.517 ms 47.375 ms 46.330 ms
15 vl31.dsr01.dllstx3.theplanet.com (70.85.127.29) 60.708 ms 60.559 ms 59.573 ms
16 te1-4.dsr01.dllstx2.theplanet.com (70.87.253.114) 45.791 ms 49.903 ms 49.761 ms
17 theplanet.com (70.87.6.117) 49.468 ms 48.382 ms 49.322 ms

EG
The wings of love
Premium Member
join:2006-11-18
Union, NJ

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said by JohnInSJ:

said by AVonGauss:

I believe stating that they do not have a national network would be a bit incorrect.
Just traceroute anywhere that isn't local to you, and you will see the peers that are used.
I've seen a lot of their own internal cbone and ibone infrastucture being used for transit in cross country traces as well.

JohnInSJ
Premium Member
join:2003-09-22
Aptos, CA

JohnInSJ

Premium Member

said by EG:

said by JohnInSJ:

said by AVonGauss:

I believe stating that they do not have a national network would be a bit incorrect.
Just traceroute anywhere that isn't local to you, and you will see the peers that are used.
I've seen a lot of their own internal cbone and ibone infrastucture being used for transit in cross country traces as well.
And even using their own infrastructure, every byte costs something to ship, and the pipes are in no way even remotely sized to handle every sub using 1TB/mo priced at $30-$90/mo, even if the local neighborhood plant could handle that level of use (which it can't anyway, hence the congestion management implemented THERE.)

Point being, there are issues and costs at every hop of the path, and the comcast PRODUCTS are priced to reflect the costs & desired profit levels for each product. They differentiate on speed today on the consumer side, but fix maximum usage. On the business side they fix usage much higher, but charge more for the same speeds as on the consumer side - some of that is for better support, but some is for more usage as well.

EG
The wings of love
Premium Member
join:2006-11-18
Union, NJ

EG

Premium Member

No argument there !
thor793
join:2005-09-10
Schaumburg, IL

thor793

Member

Well I blew by the cap by a bunch this month...first time. Been trying to keep it under using Tomato firmware but no way I could do it this month. So I'm going business class...same speed tier 12/2...which happens to only be slightly more expensive than 12/2 residential (like $18 or so). I saw a mention of a charge to upgrade from residential to business...but when I got signed up there was no charge. Just waiting for their operations guys to contact me to setup an appointment.

I figured I could get by on residential and stay under the cap...but nope. Not even going to chance losing my internet...need it for the consulting work I do.