 LMIB
@waldrf01.md.comcast. | reply to Matisaro
Re: My experience with Comcast bandwidth suspensio When I was first warned by Comcast, I had been running DUmeter and had only done approx 60 GB down and 20 GB up. total approx 81 GB combined both directions. When they turned me off recently, I don't know how much I had been using, but their connection was broken for approx 1 week in the middle of the month 'cause their modem kept resetting itself, so I would expect my usage for the month was probably below the last number (and no one at Comcast was ever able to tell me how much I used either month). As stated in my post about 1 page further into this discussion, They told me the amount can vary from month to month, it depends on other customers for an average, then they do some secret percentage of that average to determine who the bad little boys and girls are. |
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| Call me simple, but I still think that you can't deal with net amount of data transferred up/down, you have to equate it to an effective connect time due to the up/down speed asymmetry. As I crudely estimated on page 1 of the thread, 60 GB down translates to something like 3.8 days while 20 GB up takes ~ 10.3 days of connect time - so this mix is something like ~ 47% utilization of your available time based on a 30 day month. Change that 80 GB total usage to a mix of 40 GB down, 40 GB up and you're talking 2.5 + 20.6 = 23.1 days or ~ 77% utilization. To me, it makes much more sense to look at your consumption this way than by throwing out net volume of data exchanged in both directions.
It's probably a useful metric, since the 90 GB value mentioned by Matisaro goes anywhere between ~ 19% and 154% utilization as the mix goes from pure download to pure upload. Again, just my exceptionally simplified way of looking at things, and yes I realize that these extremes will not be realized in practice....
Either way, I do think Comcast should be able to provide much better guidance on the issue. |
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ajax25
join:2003-12-10
Colonia, NJ | reply to LMIB
said by LMIB:
When I was first warned by Comcast, I had been running DUmeter and had only done approx 60 GB down and 20 GB up. total approx 81 GB combined both directions. When they turned me off recently, I don't know how much I had been using, but their connection was broken for approx 1 week in the middle of the month 'cause their modem kept resetting itself, so I would expect my usage for the month was probably below the last number (and no one at Comcast was ever able to tell me how much I used either month). As stated in my post about 1 page further into this discussion, They told me the amount can vary from month to month, it depends on other customers for an average, then they do some secret percentage of that average to determine who the bad little boys and girls are.
So it seems that as little as 80Gb will get you put on
double secret probation. |
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| Like someone said earlier, I think it's the 20 GB upload that got you in trouble. I think they tend to feel you're running a server of some sort when the upload is that high. |
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ajax25
join:2003-12-10
Colonia, NJ | said by bondo-:
Like someone said earlier, I think it's the 20 GB upload that got you in trouble. I think they tend to feel you're running a server of some sort when the upload is that high.
Perhaps, but they don't seem to want to be too specific
about it. |
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 midranger4Stupid Is No longer in VoguePremium
join:2002-01-18
Levittown, PA | reply to ajax25
said by ajax25:
So it seems that as little as 80Gb will get you put on double secret probation.
Exactly, the abuse threshold is not only undefined but variable. Kinda like a lava light...always in flux !
It certainly appears more and more people are getting these letters and ultimately disconnected which leads me to believe a legal battle isn't far off.
I'll be sure to have my popcorn and soda ready when the battle begins. I suspect Comcast will be left licking their wounds yet again just like they were with the proxy server debacle.
Either clearly defined limits will be established, published, and enforced or Comcast will crawl back under their collective rock and stop the witch hunts of the type mentioned in this thread.
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Democracy is the illustion of Freedom |
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ajax25
join:2003-12-10
Colonia, NJ | My plan is to go through all of the process of asking
for the information (what is the limit and what did I
do) and then to write letters to anyone and everyone
that I can think of explaining what is going on.
I'll be doing this wether my service is
suspended/terminated or not. |
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| reply to midranger4
said by midranger4:
said by ajax25:
So it seems that as little as 80Gb will get you put on double secret probation.
Exactly, the abuse threshold is not only undefined but variable.
Sure - variable in the way you quantify bandwidth, maybe not in the way Comcast does if they look at % utilization relative to your capped values and also factor in whether some type of "sustained peak" utlization (i.e. something like a net max usage over some short time period) on a particular node exceeds a defined threshold that signals congestion (and need to upgrade hardware) ahead. If this is what they do, and it seems reasonable, it is very easy to see why they don't want to publicize the "limits" - Consider 2 users in the same market on different nodes with identical usage rates and patterns. On a heavily subscribed node, one of these users may be flagged as a bandwidth hog, while the user on an undersubscribed node gets no notice.
Again, tossing out numbers all to casually, if the heavy user on the heavily subscribed node uses 20 times the average bandwidth of users of that node - don't you think Comcast would gladly trade 1 heavy user for 20 average ones without a system upgrade rather than get all 21 users and need a hardware upgrade? Is this fair? No. Does it make business sense? Sure - if you provision tiered service levels for the ultrahigh volume users. Failure to do this leads to anecdotal threads like these playing out in regulatory hearings down the road.
But let me flame myself here - THAT'S PURE SPECULATION!!! Correct - which is why Comcast should define the situation better for the users out there. Too much pure speculation, my own and others, is floating around and that's due solely to how Comcast is approaching this situation. |
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 novaflareThe Dragon Was HerePremium
join:2002-01-24
Barberton, OH | reply to bondo-
said by bondo-:
Like someone said earlier, I think it's the 20 GB upload that got you in trouble. I think they tend to feel you're running a server of some sort when the upload is that high.
I can do 10 gigs a month upload updateing web sites and chating
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my fav mmorpg »www.rubiesofeventide.com if you sign up use novaflare as referal |
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LMiB
@waldrf01.md.comcast. | reply to bluezanetti
What speeds did you do your math based on? I have 3.5 to 4 Mbs down and 480k up consistently. Also unless you are a fan of fuzzy math you can't take 60GB down and 20 GB up and say that 80 GB is the same as 40 in each direction unless the speeds are even CLOSE to the same in each direction.
As for other people talking about tiered service, Comcast sorta has 2 tiers, but according to the abuse department, when it comes to deciding who to cut off for using too much, everyone is compared against everyone else. If they were only comparing me to people on comcast "Pro", It would not annoy me as much. |
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| said by LMiB:
What speeds did you do your math based on? I have 3.5 to 4 Mbs down and 480k up consistently. Also unless you are a fan of fuzzy math you can't take 60GB down and 20 GB up and say that 80 GB is the same as 40 in each direction unless the speeds are even CLOSE to the same in each direction.
Assumptions were clearly stated on page 1 of this thread. 180 kB down/22.5 kB up. Down was based on what I typically saw on a large file download prior to the 3.0 upgrade. 22.5 kB came from the ~ 1:8 speed ratio I saw in speed tests that I ran for my connection (Speakeasy site) since I didn't have real numbers to play with myself. The math isn't fuzzy, just multiplication and addition. Feel free to debunk the assumptions if you have better ones handy. I will agree - these assumptions are fuzzy ones, but reasonable pre-3.0.
Regarding your comment on 60GB down/20 GB up = 80 GB = 40 GB down/40 GB up - that was my point exactly. You can't talk about the aggregate amount transferred, which the bulk of this thread seems to be discussing. My "100 GB" month may be fine, while your "100 GB" is a major problem if I just surf (that has a 1-3% upload component) and you are constantly uploading large files and that comprises 50% of your comsumed bandwidth.
Cheers,
Blue |
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| reply to LMiB
said by LMiB:
I have 3.5 to 4 Mbs down and 480k up consistently.
480k up is certainly not typical with Comcast. Based on their current offerings, the only service that I can find that offers anything higher than 384 kbps up is the Enhanced version of Comcast Workplace, which is listed at $200/month. |
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LMiB
@waldrf01.md.comcast. | I stand corrected. I meant to type 380k. I'm on their "Pro" level. |
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