# Comcast Releasing Promised Usage Meter



## machavez00 (Nov 2, 2006)

Comcast has released a beta of their usage meter.









full story via Broadband Reports


> You'll of course recall that back 2008 we were the first to report that Comcast was implementing a clear 250 GB usage cap for all users. Despite some grumbling, this was actually a good thing, given many Comcast users spent the better part of the decade complaining that Comcast was kicking people off of the network for "excessive consumption," without actually defining what "excessive" was. Unfortunately, when Comcast implemented the cap (on residential tiers only) they didn't provide users with an official bandwidth meter.


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## phrelin (Jan 18, 2007)

Today we received an email announcing that the metering system is available in our area. Here is our meter results:








I know we watched a couple of TV shows in March and I think I downloaded the two parts of the extended version of the "Caprica" pilot from DishONLINE. We're pretty heavy home internet users, so I'm surprised at how little use shows on the meter.


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## Grentz (Jan 10, 2007)

Even with lots of internet usage total download size is not usually that much for most.

That is why the 250gb cap really made more headlines and news than it should have, only a small percentage are likely effected at all.


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## The Merg (Jun 24, 2007)

Well, nothing my e-mail yet. Customer support stated it will just show up when it's in my area.

- Merg


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## dpeters11 (May 30, 2007)

Grentz said:


> Even with lots of internet usage total download size is not usually that much for most.
> 
> That is why the 250gb cap really made more headlines and news than it should have, only a small percentage are likely effected at all.


250gb isn't bad. Frontier DSL on the other hand says acceptable use is 5gb. They claim they aren't doing anything to those that go over, but the agreements are worded in such a way that they can suspend for using more than that in a month. That should make the headlines, especially since DSL isn't shared in the same way cable is.


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## machavez00 (Nov 2, 2006)

dpeters11 said:


> 250gb isn't bad. Frontier DSL on the other hand says acceptable use is 5gb. They claim they aren't doing anything to those that go over, but the agreements are worded in such a way that they can suspend for using more than that in a month. That should make the headlines, especially since DSL isn't shared in the same way cable is.


5Gb? I've downloaded bit torrent files that were bigger than that. I'm downloading one that's 4.7gb as I'm typing this now. My brother is a bit torrent freak and exceeds that in a day sometimes. We're both with Qwest DSL. Lets see if he gets a nastygram from them. He was with Cox and hadn't got one for excess bandwidth, just the usual copyright ones.


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## dpeters11 (May 30, 2007)

machavez00 said:


> 5Gb? I've downloaded bit torrent files that were bigger than that. I'm downloading one that's 4.7gb as I'm typing this now. My brother is a bit torrent freak and exceeds that in a day sometimes. We're both with Qwest DSL. Lets see if he gets a nastygram from them. He was with Cox and hadn't got one for excess bandwidth, just the usual copyright ones.


Yep, 5gb. http://www.frontier.com/policies/residential_aup/

Like I said, they say they've made no decision on charges for going over, but in the same paragraph say they can suspend or terminate your service. They do have offers for Dish Network and online backup with Carbonite. I never got an answer on whether those were exempt. The best I got was the tech on the phone telling me how they felt about the cap. And now Frontier is getting bigger, taking over Verizon land lines.


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## phrelin (Jan 18, 2007)

The way I look at it, Comcast's 250GB limit would allow sufficient space to supplement a more modest satellite package with Netflicks or even bit torrent. But 250GB is not going to permit someone to replace 4 hours of HD TV shows 30 nights a month. That's 400-500 GB.

I think it's more than fair, though. I'm certainly far more comfortable now that I know what I'm using.


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## Grentz (Jan 10, 2007)

Wow, 5gb would seriously suck.

I had over 65gb of download last month on my slow 1.5mb line


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