Need Help with Staying Within at&t dsl caps


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Hi All

 

Need help staying within at&t dsl caps, eventually gonna get a larger hard drive to store more files, and such--Anyways just this month alone close to going over already, and hasn't even been the full billing cycle yet.   Is there anything in 8.1 I can do to reduce the usage perhaps?

 

(Remove 8.1 Modern apps that I don't need?)   Reduce skydrive usage?   set for metered connection?  

 

so far this month already up to 146.39 downloaded, with 5 days left in billing cycle

 

Antiviirus used on all system is Avast

 

All systems secured

 

Network consists of

Directv on Demand (not used much this month)

1 Desktop Windows 8.1 PC

1 Windows Phone 8

1 Desktop-Vista 32bit-WIreless

1 Desktop Windows 7 32 bit-Wireless

1 Laptop-XP

1 Android phone

1 Android phone

1 Sisters laptop

1 Nook Tablet

 

Router: Netgear 7550N gateway from at&T

 

 

cap is 150gbs a month

 

 

any tips will be helpful

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Are there any internet provider beside ATT in your area? I would jump ship ASAP when a internet provider start capping my bandwith for any reason.

 

Back to your question. The only good tip I can give you is just reduce your media streaming consumption Youtube, Netflex, Amazone Prime etc.

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I am sorry that your cap is so low. I couldn't imagine being capped like that. The only things I can offer up are:

 

1. Limit visiting pages with video ads or use a filter to block any autoplaying of videos.

2. Watch your youtube cat videos in a lower resolution (there may even be a browser extension that will do this automatically.

3. Browsing the internet with your phone instead of a desktop PC should lower your usage a bit. I display my android phone on my laptop using an app because I hate using the internet on a tiny phone.

4. Make sure no one is connecting to your network who shouldn't be (ie. unsecured wireless).

5. Download or save videos / software that you think you'll use more than once. 

6. Only use cloud storage if / when you need it. USB sticks can go a long way in certain situations.

Edit: 7. Pick and choose what programs you allow to automatically update.

8. Advise everyone else in your household to take steps to limit their bandwidth as well.

 

Good luck! :)

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i would just keep internet use to very basic stuff (like some websites and minimal downloading/video playback) if you want to play it safe.

 

i only recently moved to 250GB cap on AT&T as i used to have their basic DSL service which was 150GB cap but after they gave us a free transition to U-Verse (i.e. Fiber Optic stuff they say) i now have a 250GB cap and i should be able to breathe a bit better now as i was managing to not go over my 150GB cap which i think i had since about May 2011 til Sep 24th as Sep 25th i moved over to the U-Verse which is 250GB cap.

 

i generally monitor my bandwidth use through my router running DD-WRT firmware as it shows how much i downloaded. but since i was pretty used to staying under 150GB for a while i should have no trouble staying under 250GB nowadays. before they put the 150GB/250GB caps in place i was averaging around 210GB a month for the previous year basically.

 

but in general... avoid HD video if you only got 150GB cap per month as that can burn up bandwidth quickly as SD video allows you to get much more. i usually only do HD video in some cases where i think ill need it more on a movie.

 

p.s. even if you change to Comcast that's still a 250GB cap and i think Comcast and U-Verse is all i got available in my area.

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p.s. even if you change to Comcast that's still a 250GB cap and i think Comcast and U-Verse is all i got available in my area.

Comcast 250GB cap is no longer in effect. I no longer see their data meeter in my account :)

I average around ~350GB a Month.

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Comcast 250GB cap is no longer in effect. I no longer see their data meeter in my account :)

I average around ~350GB a Month.

It's in effect just may not be for your area. It's now up to 300GB as well with $10 for 50GB overage.

------------------

As for the OP maybe the best place to start is to see whats using up most of the cap per month. Since you have AT&T DSL you can use a router with network monitoring built in (or use Tomato/DD-WRT) to see where your traffic is going and who is using it. From then on you can see where or how you can lessen your usage. All of the above statements which mentioned lowering bitrates (for Netflix and Hulu they have an option on the website to always give you low bitrate video instead of auto adjusting).

The other option is switching ISPs of-course. I can imagine the competition offers some caps that are higher if they have any at all.

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Thank you all so very much...

 

Uverse cap is 250gb a month, unknown if enforced or not

 

dsl cap is 150gbs a month with a $10 overage

 

monitor it now with at&t's bandwidth meter site

 

might get my own router at Christmas if can afford, but will see

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I used to work for AT&T as a contract call centre worker and I can tell you with certainty

 

1. UVERSE is 250GB per month and it is strictly inforced at least said was the case when I left about 6 months ago

2. Not all uverse connections are fiber to the prem, most are fiber to the curb

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Do you really think its the video ads causing you to go over 150GB.. Really?? Come On!!

Yes comcast still provides access to the meter

post-14624-0-80205800-1387713371.png

Now in my area atleast there is this note

Note:enforcement of the 250GB data consumption threshold is currently suspended

Oct was I would of gone over your 150GB limit, but I also uploaded over 56GB of video to my owncloud setup on my webhost for backup.. Or I would of be no where close to it.

I you are going over 150GB, your streaming something all the time.. Be it video, be it music, or you torrenting, etc.

So last night we watched 2 movies over netflix, and also got a large file into my dropbox from a share.

post-14624-0-33341300-1387713801.png

here is the netflix moving watching

post-14624-0-28859300-1387714568.png

So yeah last night was fairly high usage.. I have multiple internet connected devices, 2 phones, ipad, kindle fire, dvrs, laptops, 4 vms running my desktop and as you can see normally don't do anywhere close to that sort of usage. If we did that clearly we would be over.. But look at the other days this month, on track to be way under even your 150GB limit.

So no its not video ads in your browsing causing you to go over ;) If you want to get a handle on it, then you need to find out what is using it. Phones and tables should be able to show you their usage. Your other computers put some software on them say http://www.netlimiter.com/ has a free monitor part that can tell you how much bandwidth and what is using it.

To be honest the only real thing that is going to use that kind of bandwidth is major torrenting, or your just seeding all month on something popular? Or you streaming quite often movies or have maybe spotify on in the background all day, pandora, etc. But before you go blocking the video in ads, and watching youtube in SD ;) Why don't you figure out what is using it.. For all you have some machines infected sending out spam all day? Or part of some botnet sending out ddos against their masters target, etc.

150GB a month is 5GB a day -- that is a SHITLOAD of cat videos from youtube in 1080P, I mean a shitload!!! So something else is going on.

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bikeman25, I personally think that knowing how much bandwidth your personal desktop is using is very important.  The bandwidth may not be from your PC.  Someone else or other PC on the network maybe doing some bandwidth hogging.  I suggest that you may want to use "Network Meter" from addgadget.com.  The gadget is free.  It runs as Windows Gadget Sidebar.  Here's how it looks like:

 

Network_Meter6.png

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Yeah thats great if he is on dialup, or or has a edge connection on his phone.. But sorry normal surfing of webpages is not going to come close to 5GB a day that he needs to use up to exceed his limit.. Unless he is surfing HD video porn sites and streaming the video in HD for hours a day?

And once the page is visited once much of it is in the browser cache anyway, etc.

What is more likely is one of his desktops is doing p2p, or someone is watching netflix or hulu all the time? The normal surfing of websites is not going to come anywhere close to using up 5GB of data a day.. No where Close!!! Either he is infected with something, or he is using P2P quite a bit, or has multiple audio/video streams going. Netflix, Hulu, Pandora, Spotify, etc.

What he needs to do is identify the top talkers and address that usage.

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It's in effect just may not be for your area. It's now up to 300GB as well with $10 for 50GB overage.

------------------

As for the OP maybe the best place to start is to see whats using up most of the cap per month. Since you have AT&T DSL you can use a router with network monitoring built in (or use Tomato/DD-WRT) to see where your traffic is going and who is using it. From then on you can see where or how you can lessen your usage. All of the above statements which mentioned lowering bitrates (for Netflix and Hulu they have an option on the website to always give you low bitrate video instead of auto adjusting).

The other option is switching ISPs of-course. I can imagine the competition offers some caps that are higher if they have any at all.

 

Says Cap suspended on our account, and that's a good thing, we would use up the cap in a week maybe two, also at least here U-Verse also is not enforcing the cap, if both were to start enforcing it we'd be royally screwed 

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Well all I know is my machine just refreshed with WIndows 8.1 Pro Here, Avast antivirus says machine is clean, so does Malwarebytes, scanned the other PC's as well with Avast, and Malwarebytes, totally clean on those as well.  Possibly someone else in family using Pandora or something all day...but not really sure, but still investigating that.  

 

All Machines are running Avast Free 2014.9.0.2011

 

All machines have malwarebytes Free

 

All Machines using Internet Explorer various versions

 

On Windows 7 and up PCs, Internet Explorer 11

9 on Vista

and 8 on XP laptop

Is No Torrenting going on

(Just using Secondlife 3D game most of the days, daily)

 

Cell phone not on wifi unless needed now

post-106584-0-74413700-1387927548.jpg

post-106584-0-45841900-1387927556.jpg

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I'd suggest a closer look at your router.  In particular, at the connected devices. You should be able to lock down access via mac addresses.  I suspect someone may be stealing your wifi and downloading huge files.  Review your router log files, block sites which you question.

 

You could also reduce a lot of unnecessary traffic by killing off live tiles.

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Router I did restart and changed the wireless security key recently.   Live titles reduced already--more so than they were before caps started...Even removed some apps I didn't open much..

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Dude its not freaking live tiles downloading 12GB a day??

You need to put on some sort of meter on each machine to figure out what is using your bandwidth.. Because its sure an the hell is not some apps on 8.1 and or tiles using 12GB in 1 day..

A quick google, pandora is 60MB an hour rounded up.. So lets say its that.. Times X 24 is 1.5GB -- you have multiple days your doing 12GB plus..

Put a meter on everyone one of your boxes and find the top talker!

12GB a day - is like 4-6 movies streamed each day.

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Skydrive I reduced usage alot

 

didn't set up 8.1 for metered network yet

 

meter is in place on all the machines now--will see what that turns up

 

Avast Antivirus shows no viruses on any PC, and Malwarebytes clean

 

Directv is also connected to the Network, but no on demand downloads done lately

 

Cell phones off wifi unless needed

 

Nook tablets on wifi, but just reading books I think family does on those

 

Laptop off most of the time

 

Secondlife 3D game ran all day long, but no media streaming or anything

 

Mom and Sister do have Android Phones without Security software installed on them--could that be the underlying cause or part of it--On Mom's originally I did install Avast Mobile security, but when she took phone in for unrelated issue, Tech in Sprint store removed it) 

 

Will see what the meter says in a few days for all systems, and report back is best I can do for now

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What exactly is going on in Secondlife if not streaming then? That thing can be a potential bandwidth hog if you are jumping around sims, or people's avatar's rezzing in.  I would highly suggest if you got the space to set the cache on that to something very high, depending on the viewer, Firestorm can go to about a 10GB cache file which might potentially save bandwidth if sticking around the same sims.

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Done cache file higher than it was...usually i'm driving for Secondlife work, going to SIm Events, usually stick around the same sim 90 percent of the time.   Thanks for the tip, really appreciate that Martog

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I just know due to the rather openness for creativity can lead to some serious bandwidth usage on SL.

 

That and end users may not own up to doing something if asked.  Had a case where a client had placed a pen on a laptop keyboard, but claimed they didn't close the screen all the way and had no idea how the screen got cracked on the laptop.  And it was like a month old too, good thing they had accidental coverage.

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All the machines have no torrent software installed--I triple checked that part earlier today, scanned full scans all systems.   been working on solving this issue for a few days now, getting there slowly so far..will see what the bandwidth meters say or give any clue as to actual machine possibly.

 

Only other program I left installed on my HP P6-2133W Desktop was HP Support Assistant, not sure if that is really needed, if not i'll rip it out from Admin account early tomorrow morning--think uninstalling from Admin account shouldn't cause any issues on user account I hope

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