Charter Spectrum → Transmitted data per 'normal' use

With all the questions of caps, I wanted to start a database of normal/average transfer used for various items. I'll start with what I've tested in the last two days:

-Streaming a 45 min TV episode (non-HD) on Netflix - About 500mb

-Bandwidth used while patching World of Warcraft - About 10% larger than patch size

Also worthy of note are the following that are so low they don't really impact your monthly bandwidth totals, no matter how long you use them:

- Playing an online game
- Browsing text based webpages

What I'd love to see, the amount used when streaming HD sports and movies.

Well "HD" downloads from places like XBL, PSN and Itunes are in the 6 GB range for a 2 hour movie. I've read by others s I'm not sure that HD streams from Netflix are maybe in the 4 GB range.

"HD" versions of Tv shows from places like Hulu, etc are about 2.1 Mbps max. Not really "HD" in my book but that's what they say.

NBC Direct has "HD" downloads in the 900 MB range for a 45 minute show.

MLB.Tv will have HD streaming at 3 Mbps. That's the highest I've seen to date for any streaming service.

normal use I guess to them is surfing the internet circa 1999

Just sitting there connected to my router with nothing else:

4-5 GB or ARP traffic per month.

In St Louis, Missouri, Charter includes ESPN360.com for free with their internet service, which has live streaming sports (some in "HD"), and hundreds of recorded events that you can watch as well. They use the Move player which doesn't support Linux, so I never actually use it, but I would totally use it all the time if I could.

Make that 4-5 GB OF ARP traffic per month.

I can't stop that traffic either, it's part of the network, and it is counted by DOCSIS modem traffic counters (accessed through SNMP). Will Charter count it against the cap?

My modem gets absolutely hammered too -- even when no one in the house is on their computer. Unfortunately, I don't have a way to check to see how much traffic it's generating, Thanks for posting that info, I'll use that when I call Charter to chew their a$$e$ the first month I'm over my cap.

Still no monitoring tool, huh? They're going to have a hard time enforcing this if users have no way of monitoring their own use. I know I sure as hell don't trust Charter to do it.

HD TV shows = ~1.1GB
Non HD TV shows = ~350mb

according to Nielsen, the average american watches 4 hours of TV per day. If that's all streamed online in HD, you're easily over the 100gb cap. If you have more than 1 person sharing the internet connection (say, a family), you'd easily be over the 250gb cap and a family of four could exceed it watching only the SD shows at 350mb each.And that's not even accounting for downloading anything else, like netflix... and coincidentally all of that could be done by subscribing to charter digital cable & paying the extra fee for a DVR so you can watch it when you want (like the internet lets you do).

Just to be clear the 1.1GB HD is 720p and not 1080p.

Not sure where you people are getting your numbers from.

Netflix HD is up to 5.5 Mbps. Do the math for a 2 hour movie:

(5.5 * 60 * 120)/8 = 4950 MB or 4.95 GB

So it is safe to say a two hour HD movie on Netflix is around 5 GB. The 100 GB cap will get you 20 HD movies per month.

Now lets see what it costs per movie with the caps shall we:

Charter internet 10 Mbps: 44.95/month
Netflix with streaming: $8.99 (Lowest plan that offers unlimited streaming)

Total costs: $53.94/20 = $2.697

So it costs you $2.70 per 2 hour movie if that is all you use your connection for. Hmm. How much was a Charter PPV movie? $4.99 for SD movie and $5.99 for HD movie.

The whole CAPS thing is totally designed to kill Netflix and other streaming services. The online streaming sports passes are already cheaper than Charter's plans. A home theater PC or streaming STB gives the same or better service than Charter's boxes.

that was weird. i just talked to charter.net live chat support .. and either there isn't 20MB or this guy is outdated?

Thank you for choosing Charter Chat Live! A Customer Care representative from HSD Support will be with you shortly.
You have been connected to TTD Michael .

TTD Michael : Good morning! My name is Michael. Thanks for using Charter Internet Chat Support. How may I provide you with the best quality service today?

Peter: Hi, will charter get 20MB within the end of feb 09?
TTD Michael : May I ask on what do you mean by the 20 MB?
Peter : you know how there is 5 MB , 10 MB, 16 MB
Peter : is there going to be 20 MB soon?
Peter : i was trying to find out if my area will get that
TTD Michael : You mean the Mbps the rating for the Internet speed.
Peter : yes.
TTD Michael : Oh, okay.

TTD Michael : No we don't have the 20 Mbps internet speed but there will be a High Speed Internet Ultra 60.

TTD Michael : Charter High-Speed Internet® Ultra 60 (download speeds up to 60 Mbps) is our fastest tier of residential service offering blazing fast High-Speed Internet service. Using DOCSIS 3.0 quad channel bonding, this speed is over 30 times faster than DSL from the phone company and 890 times faster than dial-up. More speed offers a customer an overall better Internet experience – streaming video is smooth and uninterrupted.
Peter Tong: but that isn't going to be expand anywhere but st. louis right? for now
TTD Michael : Yes, that is true. Just keep posted for updates on our website at www.charter.com.

Peter : i see. okay thank you.

so there no 20MB? or he don't know about it?

Where is it priced that low and why such a disparity in pricing? I'm paying $69.99/month for 10Mbps.

Streaming with Netflix is stupid if you care about not going over the cap.

Also...

»blog.netflix.com/2008/11 ··· ing.html
We experimented with first-generation WMV3 encodes at 4000kbps and 5500kbps, but settled on second-generation HD encodes with VC1AP at 2600kbps and 3800kbps, which extends their accessibility down to lower home broadband connection

Negative on that 5.5mbps.

Just download TV episodes within 30 min of them airing @ 1.1gb rather than wasting that bandwidth on a supposedly massive streaming version.

You can find HD movies @ 4.37GB each. Most stuff is not worth watching in HD though...

Anyone know how much bandwidth streaming radio uses?

I disagree. Caps are stupid because there is all of this great content out there to be consumed by broadband users. Cable providers see that content as a threat to their "core" business (CATV) so they implement these stupid caps in an attempt to force people to use TV as the delivery system of as much of that content as possible.

If the issue really is with torrenting -- then they should block torrents, otherwise most people will see this as nothing more than cable's attempt to prevent customers from getting the content they want in the manner they want by almost forcing them to keep CATV to avoid going over their cap.

I'm interested to see what happens to the first wave of users Charter tries to throttle/block due to over-cap issues.

Everyone knows that Charter is trying to get as many people on its networks as possible, and in order to do that, if they don't have the bandwidth /equipment available, then they rather have 2-3 people chewing up 2GB/month (or whatever the cap is) each paying $40/month ($80-120 in revenue), compared to 1 person using 4-6GB/month @ $40/month.

The only solution to this is to have more competition, so end users can get the best deal. Too bad most markets only have 1 or 2 options.

Competition is always going to be a problem. For some areas it will be size/population density that prevent some companies from entering the market. For others it will be about how franchising is set-up. And, we know that Charter won't allow Comcast/Time Warner to user their infrastructure to sell their services and why would Comcast and Time Warner want to establish their own infrastructure outside of their franchised areas? I'm speculating that there is a convenient "don't tread on my territory and I won't tread on yours" spoken or unspoken agreement amongst these companies.

In my neighborhood, there was absolutely NO competition for Charter until AT&T UVerse came along mid last year.

Caps won't fix the bandwidth problem, at least not until the end of the month when everyone is running out. Speed will still be slow during the certain times of the day which are already known.

This is content restriction. If you are about to go over the cap, you're more likely to rent a movie via OnDemand and pay them instead of renting it from a cheaper place online or downloading it illegally.

I did a few calculations for you here based on the stream bitrate.

Bitrate, Transfer, Time to Cap (100GB , in days)
256kbit, 110MB/hr, 39 (Never reached)
128kbit, 55MB/hr, 78 (Never reached)
64kbit, 27MB/hr, .. (Never reached)
32kbit, 14MB/hr, ..

(128kbit/8bits)=16kBytes/s
16kBytes/s * 3600 seconds/hr = 57000kBytes = 55MB

That's exactly what I'm paying for the 5/512 speed! Thought they were bumping the 5/512 up to the 10mbps?

You're paying the $70? Or the $45?

Man. I'm totally bummed. I live in West Covina, CA and our telco Verizon doesn't have any Internet services where my home is located. Charter is the only choice, which is definitely upsetting. I'm presently paying $45 for 5mbps, and after the promotional 6 months time frame is up, it's up to $55. This totally sucks.

Anybody go over their cap yet (that you've counted) and has Charter called you up demanding you to pay?

My last bill for 10/1 was:

Internet: 44.99
Internet Plus: 5.00
Internet Total: 49.99/m
Discount for 12mo: -15/m
Final Total: 34.99/m

Can any of the UMatter2Chrtr people explain why there is so much difference ($25.00 difference) in pricing???

I can understand prices varying a bit from one place to the other, but this seems outrageous.

I'm not a Charter person, but market prices are just that, prices that vary by market. Happens in every industry.

Exactly. You can expect extremely high prices when no other competition exists. An example in my area. Here are the prices with no promotion or bundle.

5mb/512 $54.99
10mb/1mb $64.99
16mb/2mb $79.99

Actually from the site. It says those prices are with a bundle with another service. We have phone as well. It is $10 more if you do not have another service. We are currently on the 16mb/2mb promo for $54.99 So the prices with just internet are:

5mb/512 $64.99
10mb/1mb $74.99
16mb/2mb $89.99

©2008 Charter Communications. *Offer valid to new residential customers only. To be considered a new Charter customer, customer must not have subscribed to Charter High-Speed Internet Max within the previous 30 days and customer must have no outstanding obligation to Charter. Standard rates apply after promotional period expires and vary depending on location. Installation extra. A cable modem, set-top box and/or network card may be required at installation. Equipment charges may apply. Internet speeds may vary. Charter does not guarantee data will be secure. Compared to 56kbps dial-up and 1.5Mbps DSL. Price is for customers with at least one other Charter service; unbundled Charter High-Speed Internet price is $10 more per month. Taxes, fees and surcharges are extra and will vary depending on location. Activation requires a valid service address and may be subject to credit approval, or prepayment or require a major credit card. All programming, packages, pricing and services provided are subject to the terms and conditions of subscriber agreement and are subject to change. Visit charter.com/30day for full details on 30-Day Money-Back Guarantee. Services not available in all areas. Other restrictions may apply. Call for full details.

p.s.

I hate to see the price of the Ultra60 if and when it gets here.

Fortunately, I have other options, and they are looking better and better all the time!!!

Sorry, should've clarified, although it should be obvious that I'm paying the $45. Who in their right mind would pay $70 for the 5/512?!!

I WILL NOT pay more than current price for ANY internet. That is just plain stupid, IMO, and truthfully, even $45 is to much!!

I think most of you will find that as the industry and technology changes, most HFC-based internet providers will, at least in some respects, be implementing caps. When these systems were engineered, plotted and built - the demand was different. It's easy to say, "Well, then upgrade". It's not as simple as that. It takes time, money, planning, etc..

Bandwidth is regulated by the laws of physics as much as anything else. Caps are created to keep a balance. I wouldn't get too bent out of shape about them just yet. If the caps are found to be too low across the board, I'm sure they'll be adjusted accordingly.

Those of you who claim that certain cable companies operate the way they do because of a "monopoly" or because there's no other "competition" are misinformed. There is more competition in the video and HSI industry now that ever before.

I've worked for, and been a customer of, quite a few cable companies...for the most part...they're all about the same. You take the good with the bad.