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C_Chipperson
Monster Rain
Premium Member
join:2009-01-17
00000

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C_Chipperson to joetaxpayer

Premium Member

to joetaxpayer

Re: Netflix bandwidth - Is 1GB/hr at HD accurate?

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SD Netflix stream
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SD Netflix stream
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first 10 minutes of HD stream
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second 10 minutes of HD stream
said by joetaxpayer:

(I posted this somewhere, don't see it here)

I called NetFlix yesterday. Answered fast, nice gal.
She said their streaming is about 1GB/hr at HD.

I am trying to find a user with a good router based meter who can verify. I'm not looking to prove my point, so much as find the truth. If that number it right, it does take down my concern quite a bit, and my multiple TiVo movie watching example turns into a chunk of usage but not my original, much larger numbers.
Here are some screen caps of Tomato while I was watching Southpark Season 9 Episode 2 - "Die, Hippie, Die" LOL. Next I'll watch 30 Rock and post screen caps again. So for SD, it seems to be around 850 MB/hour for SD.

EDIT See the attached graph of 30 Rock HD Stream. It is more than 1GB/hr for sure. It was around 660 MB for about 21 minutes of HD video. It dropped to zero kb/sec for the last 5 minutes. so, 660/21 = 1885 MB/hr for HD

If anyone has a way to show how much data has been transferred in the last x number of minutes, that would be awesome. With Tomato, I have to take these 10 minute windows and do math. Hopefully I am close to being accurate.

joetaxpayer
I'M Here Till Thursday
join:2001-09-07
Sudbury, MA
552.8 23.8

joetaxpayer

Member

said by C_Chipperson:

said by joetaxpayer:

I called NetFlix yesterday. Answered fast, nice gal.
She said their streaming is about 1GB/hr at HD.
So, 660/21 = 1885 MB/hr for HD

Thanks! Maybe another user can confirm?

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

JohnInSJ

Premium Member

quote:
Maybe another user can confirm
They can't because it will vary movie to movie (netflix uses a variable rate encode, depends on amount of motion in movie)

Also, netflix streams at a higher bitrate then the playback rate (ie, you download a 2 hour movie in about 100 minutes), so the "higher" number above is misleading, as the last 20 minutes of a movie will be 0 bytes downloaded.

As a general rule, figure on 1.5GB/hour and you'll be close enough.
K Patterson
Premium Member
join:2006-03-12
Columbus, OH

1 recommendation

K Patterson to joetaxpayer

Premium Member

to joetaxpayer
Here's what Netflix says they do:

»blog.netflix.com/2008/11 ··· ing.html
(This has been posted before according to BBR)

The delivery rate is controlled by your player and the capabilities of your connection as explained in the article.

If you are able to use the fastest rate, 3800kbits/sec, it comes to 1.71 GBytes/hour.

joetaxpayer
I'M Here Till Thursday
join:2001-09-07
Sudbury, MA
552.8 23.8

joetaxpayer

Member

Ok, K, and John, I'll take their word for it, I was misunderstanding VBR a bit I think, and was thinking those were peak, not sustained.

So 3800kbs = 1.71 GB/h

They go on to say they are experimenting with

5500kbs = 2.475 GB/h (or the 5GB for a 2hr movie I guessed way early in this thread).

Someone referenced processor speeds and Hard Drive/Flash drive progress. Funny, NetFlix states "We believe Moore's law will drive home broadband higher and higher enabling full 1080p60 encodes in a few years." Higher, at least in term of speeds available, I suppose.

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

1 recommendation

JohnInSJ

Premium Member

said by joetaxpayer:

...enabling full 1080p60 encodes in a few years." Higher, at least in term of speeds available, I suppose.
And expected usage. And cost.
We were stuck with 6/.6mb service as "really fast" for several years, and now that's both fairly common and fairly slow speed-wise (except for those folks off in the sticks)

Honestly, with widespread moves to 12.5, 25, 50Mbps service the usage will continue to climb, and caps will move up.

So sure, in a few years (years >=2) comcast won't be able to justify 250gb as a cap, and it will go up. But its not likely to happen this week

Nerdtalker
Working Hard, Or Hardly Working?
MVM
join:2003-02-18
San Jose, CA

1 edit

Nerdtalker

MVM

Prediction: The 250G Cap Will Increase

said by JohnInSJ:

Honestly, with widespread moves to 12.5, 25, 50Mbps service the usage will continue to climb, and caps will move up.

So sure, in a few years (years >=2) comcast won't be able to justify 250gb as a cap, and it will go up. But its not likely to happen this week
You know, what you've said is exactly right.

I've been kind of sitting on the sidelines this whole time, watching, because I think that the majority of what there is to be said has already been said. I hate this issue the whole way around, and honestly, talking about it just makes me want to find the nearest wall and bash myself against it until I forget about what I was thinking about. I was wrong at the very beginning about the original throttling (I didn't believe it), and I was wrong about them implementing this cap (didn't think it would ever happen).

That said, I'm completely sure I can predict that a few years down the road, they're going to be stuck with a number of interesting problems which they've created for themselves:

• The 250GB number in and of itself, is arbitrary. What makes 250GB so special? I have yet to see any sort of statistical, logical, reasonable backing behind the number other than "it's a reasonable number, and if you're downloading more than it, you're obviously just a warez/P2P/streaming radio ripper/streaming video junkie/pr0n addict." Until Comcast demonstrates something, anything reasonable about this number which makes it intrinsically special, I'm still calling it out.

• There is still no provision for increasing the cap over time as the network capacity scales. Everyone keeps talking about how DOCSIS 3.0 is coming with faster speeds, well, capacity is going to increase if Comcast (and other ISPs) don't immediately increase their caps so that they're in the same concurrency-saturation problem again. There's some sort of Moore's law equivalent here where the cap should be linked to a statistically correlated value, which gives us the cap. Anything else is purely arbitrary.

• User base usage as a whole is increasing. Netflix, Hulu, and other streaming, web-dependent, bandwidth intense applications are coming, and the networks are already straining. Comcast has certainly done a better job than other ISPs at managing the slow but steady increase of traffic, but still, at some point very soon 250GB is going to feel a whole lot tighter than it does now. Unless that cap is growing with some sort of correlation to what the majority of userbase is doing monthly, everyone is going to run into that brick wall.

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

2 edits

1 recommendation

JohnInSJ

Premium Member

said by Nerdtalker:

Unless that cap is growing with some sort of correlation to what the majority of userbase is doing monthly, everyone is going to run into that brick wall.
Supposedly, it is the number where 99% of the subs don't cross the line.

I *am* tracking my usage on my 12/2 business class service.



(that graph missed 5GB, as I was still futzing with it on april 1-2 and reset the counters.)

So far, in a household of three heavy users and a business with 4 domain websites, email server for 10 people, and a guy doing web2.0 development/experiments for a living, I'm averaging 5GB total up/down a day. If that holds steady, on a typical month that works out to 150GB. So I have roughly 100GB over my typical use "wiggle room" for unusual usage patterns in a month.

I don't think that my line's usage is typical today - likely that would be the upper quarter of usage, so to me it seems the 250GB number has a fair bit of headroom. We've gone around the track why that's not true for everyone (after all, those 1% folks are actual, real users) but pretty much that seems to be it.

Note, interestingly, I moved from 6/.8 DSL just a month ago, and while I did not track usage then, my usage pattern was exactly the same. For me, the increased speed just means stuff takes half as much time to accomplish - my line is essential idle 50% more then it used to be.

Sunny
Runs from Clowns

join:2001-08-19

2 recommendations

Sunny

I have no idea if our usage is typical or not. Two people here. We both have Netflix accounts and download software. We are obviously not consistent month to month.


Tomato Router Firmware Meter

sturmvogel6
Obama '08
join:2008-02-07
Houston, TX

1 edit

sturmvogel6 to JohnInSJ

Member

to JohnInSJ

Again, I Am A Heavy User

The problem is that mediocre or medium users proclaim always that they are "heavy" users and they have "headroom". I presume that gives them a good feeling.

A heavy user is somebody like me. Of course, CC considers that as "abuse".

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

2 edits

1 recommendation

JohnInSJ

Premium Member


If you use more then 99 out of 100 people, you're a very heavy user, just like if you have more money then 99 out of 100 people, you're very rich.

sturmvogel6
Obama '08
join:2008-02-07
Houston, TX

2 edits

sturmvogel6

Member

said by JohnInSJ:

If you use more then 99 out of 100 people, you're a very heavy user, just like if you have more money then 99 out of 100 people, you're very rich.

Not if everyone around you is quite poor.

dadkins
Can you do Blu?
MVM
join:2003-09-26
Hercules, CA

1 edit

5 recommendations

dadkins to JohnInSJ

MVM

to JohnInSJ

»www.youtube.com/watch?v= ··· 1nwQsfAA



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

1 edit

IPPlanMan to sturmvogel6

Member

to sturmvogel6
Didn't you get the memo? We're all bandwidth-hogs now....

sturmvogel6
Obama '08
join:2008-02-07
Houston, TX

sturmvogel6

Member

I was always a bandwidth and CPU "hog" since the days of MILNet in 1988.

funchords
Hello
MVM
join:2001-03-11
Yarmouth Port, MA

funchords

MVM

said by sturmvogel6:

I was always a bandwidth and CPU "hog" since the days of MILNet in 1988.
I think you've got me beat, although maybe I was doing FidoNet around that time.

Wow!

sturmvogel6
Obama '08
join:2008-02-07
Houston, TX

sturmvogel6

Member

said by funchords:
said by sturmvogel6:

I was always a bandwidth and CPU "hog" since the days of MILNet in 1988.
I think you've got me beat, although maybe I was doing FidoNet around that time.

Wow!
Yes, the good old days. Even in that time, one was always a "hog" for using too much CPU time, too much load on a 2400 line, too much time connected, incorrect packet scheduling, and so on.

The more things change, the more they stay the same, but now they are much more visible due to more commonplace use and more corporate greed.