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univbee posted:The main thing with GoG is that their games are a hell of a lot smaller than Steam's; the biggest game on that site is like a 3.5 gig download and very few of their titles are over a gig. This is a huge difference from Steam where they have more than a few single games in the 25+ gig range. Fine, say Direct2Drive instead. The point still stands.
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Jan 10, 2011 14:38
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marketingman posted:Online backup, TV streaming, IPTV, iTunes... I can't think of much more. poo poo, I'd forgotten about online backup. Now we're starting to get into harder-to-deal-with numbers of services. I thought it was possible to work within the 100 gig limit if certain sites were "free" (e.g. if Steam didn't count towards my quota, 100 gigs would probably be fine for me), but adding online backup to the mix does complicate this. The big issue right now is that while "heavy" internet users used to be able to go crazy and not affect your average internet user who used email and that's it, the increase in popular and legal bandwidth-heavy services have started eating into that. While only 10% of people are going "over," a shitload of users are probably using a pretty decent chunk of their monthly quota. Back in the early 2000s, almost everyone on an ISP would just use their DSL/Cable for basic internet and email, and probably a decent chunk of their users weren't using more than about 200 megs a month. Now with sites like Facebook and YouTube in the mix, the average internet user is probably using at least a few gigs, and if they use stuff like iTunes and Steam that adds up. So now instead of a sea of low-bandwidth users with the occasional heavy blip user (i.e. us), we now have a ton of people using a significant chunk of their share, and now all of a sudden there isn't sufficient overhead for heavy users to get by without calling attention to themselves. The bigger issue is that Canadian ISPs don't seem interested in implementing any sorts of solutions. While everyone bitches about Australian and New Zealand ISPs, at the very least they're are actually trying to tackle the problem and offer customers a lot of options. Freezones, increased traffic during off-hours...or hell, even just more reasonable overage charges. It costs money to move data, fine, but overage shouldn't be a 2000%+ markup. No one should end up with a $200+ suprise bill. univbee fucked around with this message at 17:21 on Jan 10, 2011 |
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Jan 10, 2011 17:08
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univbee posted:The bigger issue is that Canadian ISPs don't seem interested in implementing any sorts of solutions. While everyone bitches about Australian and New Zealand ISPs, at the very least they're are actually trying to tackle the problem and offer customers a lot of options. Freezones, increased traffic during off-hours...or hell, even just more reasonable overage charges. It costs money to move data, fine, but overage shouldn't be a 2000%+ markup. No one should end up with a $200+ suprise bill. The reason they aren't doing anything is because there isn't really a capacity problem, at least in Bell's case. Somehow Bell showed these numbers to the CRTC and instead of telling them to gently caress off they said "Oh that looks bad, sure go ahead with caps and traffic shaping" 
8ender fucked around with this message at 15:32 on Jan 26, 2011 |
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Jan 10, 2011 17:48
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Yeah that really showcased how much the CRTC is in Bell's pocket. Bell dragged their feet for ages on providing congestion figures and then when they finally do it doesn't back up their actions. This somehow gets turned into "oh ok thats reasonable go ahead". I don't know how you get from A to B in this situation without a total breakdown in understanding, conflicted loyalties or actual bribery. We need to install new regulation because without it the resellers are hosed.
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Jan 10, 2011 18:01
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So, I'm a Shaw customer who just woke up to their bullshit plan of charging for overages as everyone has been discussing. I've been a customer for over 10 years and it's baffling to me why they'd want to shoot themselves in the foot so badly. My area has the Telus Optik and it seems like I can get highspeed + some channels for about the same cost as highspeed alone from shaw (~$60) so I think I'll get signed up with them.
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Jan 11, 2011 04:41
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Why is it shooting themselves in the foot? The vast majority of customers will not give a flying gently caress. It's only the 10% of their subscriber base that uses the heavy bandwidth that will bitch, and the majority of them will grumble and accept it.
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Jan 11, 2011 04:48
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I just got a thought. Imagine what things would be like if Shaw and Rogers didn't do that territory swap like 10 years ago. The West Coast woulda been hosed a long time ago.
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Jan 11, 2011 04:49
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I'm not sure how reliable this tip is, picked it up off DSLReports. Telus is trying to capitalise on this fiasco with Shaw and is offering Optik TV/Phone/Internet for $15 each for one year. (So $45 for the three.) DSLReports posted:Give Telus a call at 1-877-495-8508 and ask about the $15/$15/$15 promo, code LWB01. And enjoy phone, TV, and unmetered Internet for $45 for the next year. I'm going to give them a call tomorrow about it.
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Jan 11, 2011 05:31
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How long until Telus gets wise to the money to be made here?
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Jan 11, 2011 05:42
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Maybe the grass isn't really greener, but Telus seem like the least predatory of the big three.
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Jan 11, 2011 05:45
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Telus + the government just dumped a shitload of money into expanding their fiber for TelusTV so I suspect they'll hold off on the caps for a while since they don't need to.
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Jan 11, 2011 05:46
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Yeah perhaps it isn't so much Shaw shooting themselves in the foot, but I know there will be a few stories on how average use family gets slammed for a big bill because a bunch of people are watching netflix or downloading rental movies from iTunes.. The 60GB limit wouldn't take that much for a family of 4 to get through. Plus people just really don't want to have to worry about internet usage, especially now that content is getting more and more demanding from a bandwidth perspective. That Telus bundle deal sounds pretty interesting, though. Do you need to get the home phone too?
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Jan 11, 2011 05:49
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Nitr0 posted:Managing a small Canadian wireless ISP (~500 customers) in a town of under 5000 people we have always enforced strict caps and high overage penalties. Just recently it was at 10GB per month with $5 per gb over. We've recently bumped it up to 25GB with the same $5 per gb over. I get emails daily from people bitching and moaning about their usage and how it's completely unfair that we are limiting their access to the internet and they want discounts on their bills, they want free months, they want 100's of GB's per month but I don't think people understand how much it actually costs to deliver internet to your front door. These types of videos and news articles don't really help our cause. Especially for a small ISP like ours it is increasingly frustrating trying to prove to our customers that we are just trying to deliver a good product to people who have no other options. We are not trying to screw anyone out of internet but unless people are willing to spend $150 per month there is no way we can reasonably upgrade our equipment to handle everyone streaming HD videos at 6pm @ 7Mb/s. Hell, our upstream costs alone are in the $14,000 range for a meager 40Mb which used to be capped at 10TB per month. Unfortunately the only other alternative is Telus since they own the fiber in the ground but surprise surprise they're not lighting up any dark fiber even though it was paid for by the Canadian government. I recently asked them for a quote on 40Mb and they laughed at me and said I could get a T1 for $1800 per month. Meanwhile they just brought in TelusTV (iptv) and 15Mb/s speeds with 60GB caps that I don't think are enforced. You can be sure they're delivering that kind of bandwidth via fiber that they're not sharing with anyone else. Cellphone services and internet access are two "can't live without" wants consumers want these days, as staying connected is so important. These businesses are just exploiting the direct lack of competition and attempting to nickle and dime the end user down so they have even more control. While not completely related to Netflix, it has already been mentioned by introducing caps these internet providers limit the use of Netflix. Coincidentally they are also cable/content providers :shocking:. In that regard, I feel that we need our regulating body to actually DO something for once, but fat chance on that. I hate the state of the market right now and their game plan but they know they can get away with it (for now). Bell is by far the worst player in the scheme of things, and as someone who has some ties with their executive I can tell you they plan to milk it for all it is worth.
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Jan 11, 2011 08:42
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less than three posted:I'm not sure how reliable this tip is, picked it up off DSLReports. I just called them. I didn't have to mention the promo code at all or anything. so it would be $45 per month for a year and it comes with the basic packages of each. They also have another promo going on for the TV that would give you the "your pick HD" combo for $45 per month for the first six months and it is combinable with the $15 other services. So for $75/month you would get Optik internet + hd cable + basic phone After 6 months it would go up to $115 I guess then after a year $133
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Jan 11, 2011 20:32
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univbee posted:The bigger issue is that Canadian ISPs don't seem interested in implementing any sorts of solutions. While everyone bitches about Australian and New Zealand ISPs, at the very least they're are actually trying to tackle the problem and offer customers a lot of options. Freezones, increased traffic during off-hours...or hell, even just more reasonable overage charges. It costs money to move data, fine, but overage shouldn't be a 2000%+ markup. No one should end up with a $200+ suprise bill. Australian/Kiwi ISPs have a good reason for having bandwidth limits - just about anything you'd want to check out is hosted overseas and there's only so much connectivity to the outside world there. This doesn't justify that they apply the caps to everything, but still. Canadian ISPs have no such excuse. Especially since America has similar issues for getting bandwidth to sparsely populated areas and a pretty drat insidious system of the only choice being slow DSL or fast cable, one cable provider per region. But there's only one major American ISP that even has a cap, Comcast, and that cap is both not enforced at all in most regions and pretty drat high anyway. What gives?
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Jan 11, 2011 21:59
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It's a twisty turvy world I live in when Telus is being made out to be the good guy. That being said Shaw would have to gently caress up much more colossally than they already have to make me ever consider Telus services. Besides it's only a matter of time before Telus announces that it's "brining our prices in line with industry standards..." Maybe in ten years the technology will be sufficiently advanced to reliably deliver all my content wirelessly and unlimited by Mobilicity or Wind.
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Jan 12, 2011 00:13
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Not necessarily Canadian internet-related, but bandwidth/telco-related anyway: http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/news/2011/01/bill-shock-consumers-choose-it-says-big-wireless.ars On being asked why they don't send out texts to warn users about the fact that they may potentially bust their data caps, CTIA had this to say: quote:But CTIA claims that even sending out SMS alerts would impose huge burdens on its members, costing them tens or even "hundreds" of millions of dollars. Some older billing systems can't handle outgoing notices, it says, and the idea of "real-time" alerts and cut-offs could be difficult for an industry that collects huge amounts of data but doesn't actually crunch the numbers as they're generated. If they're anything like Canadian telcos though, I bet they don't mind spamming their users with worthless offers every now and then. 
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Jan 12, 2011 04:48
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Videotron subscriber gets $1,800 bill for usage. Not that I'm surprised really. This is the future of Canadian Internet.
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Jan 12, 2011 20:56
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Does the shaw internet usage button show up when you exceed your monthly quota automatically or does someone need to actually flag your account? I don't see one on my account despite using a lot of netflix and the occasional torrent. Doesn't seem like the airport extreme has a usage tracker like the wrt54g did with the dd-wrt firmware unfortunately.
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Jan 12, 2011 20:59
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On that note, the Rogers quota "reminder" is completely useless. I usually only get the warning that I reached 75% of my monthly limit after I already surpassed 100%.
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Jan 12, 2011 21:31
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priznat posted:Does the shaw internet usage button show up when you exceed your monthly quota automatically or does someone need to actually flag your account? I don't see one on my account despite using a lot of netflix and the occasional torrent. It'll show up once: a) The monitoring is enabled in your area, and b) You've exceeded your cap for the first time. (You aren't billed for your first month of overages.)
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Jan 12, 2011 22:48
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ZShakespeare posted:It's a twisty turvy world I live in when Telus is being made out to be the good guy. That being said Shaw would have to gently caress up much more colossally than they already have to make me ever consider Telus services. Besides it's only a matter of time before Telus announces that it's "brining our prices in line with industry standards..." Yeah, I couldn't bring myself to actually switch to Telus after giving it a little thought. The number of times they have screwed me in the past far out weighs anything shaw has done to me (so far). Too bad Wind mobile caps your speeds if you exceed 5gb/month (if you are in a high usage area) or something.
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Jan 13, 2011 00:10
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kuddles posted:On that note, the Rogers quota "reminder" is completely useless. I usually only get the warning that I reached 75% of my monthly limit after I already surpassed 100%. It's a day behind usage, IIRC. Same thing as the online check in your account info.
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Jan 13, 2011 00:23
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Chris Knight posted:It's a day behind usage, IIRC. Same thing as the online check in your account info. No, I constantly get it much later. Even my account info will say I'm at 75%, but I won't get that warning notice for another few days.
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Jan 13, 2011 15:21
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I'm using Shaw and I emailed my MP and Tony Clement complaining about BC ISP practices and the CRTC in general. Now to lean forward and drop my pants.
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Jan 14, 2011 01:18
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It's sad that I had to drop a reseller DSL provider and move back in with Rogers, because they will actually be CHEAPER in the long run  What kinda crazy world do we live in when Rogers is the cheapest and fastest in my area 
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Jan 14, 2011 19:10
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Cheap being quite the relative term. They're going to have to pry my apparently infinite cap, $36/mth Teksavvy internet from my cold dead hands. (I've gone WAY over the 200 GB cap without a word nor fee)
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Jan 14, 2011 22:08
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teethgrinder posted:Cheap being quite the relative term. They're going to have to pry my apparently infinite cap, $36/mth Teksavvy internet from my cold dead hands. I've inquired about the 200GB cap with teksavvy tech support and the answer was that they do not actually have a way to track how much data you are transferring. Apparently Rogers has not provided them with the facility to do so.
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Jan 14, 2011 23:21
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I'm on the DSL version. They have an online tool which used to work, but it seems to be broken the vast majority of the time. I need to figure out how to measure bandwidth by port or connected device or what. It would be nice to know how much I'm using vs. my roommates watching Netflix 24/7. (I don't have a problem with them doing it, but I need data for when I'm finally capped.)
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Jan 14, 2011 23:47
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Do you guys know if this would affect Novus? They own a lot of their own fibre, but mostly centred in various city centres. I wonder if whatever occurs charge wise means they'd incur upstream usage costs. I have novus in my building and wouldn't mind switching...
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Jan 15, 2011 01:47
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Scaramouche posted:Do you guys know if this would affect Novus? They own a lot of their own fibre, but mostly centred in various city centres. I wonder if whatever occurs charge wise means they'd incur upstream usage costs. I have novus in my building and wouldn't mind switching... It won't affect novus at all.
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Jan 15, 2011 01:49
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Novus owns their own lines, they're not a reseller.
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Jan 15, 2011 02:14
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I'm seriously going to have to move across the country to downtown Vancouver just to find a good ISP soon 
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Jan 15, 2011 07:04
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Paying overage to Rogers or Bell would probably be a lot cheaper than downtown Vancouver.
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Jan 15, 2011 07:36
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Shumagorath posted:Paying overage to Rogers or Bell would probably be a lot cheaper than downtown Vancouver. +1. But living in Vancouver is nicer.
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Jan 15, 2011 07:39
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less than three posted:+1. As someone who lives in Vancouver and is currently planning to move back to Montreal, this is a house of lies. Unless you're somehow allergic to snow and want it to be substituted for rain, which would make you insane  I've been looking at my ISP options and am considering VideoTron's $100/month 15/1 unmetered business package. Anyone know details about that?
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Jan 15, 2011 21:23
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Called up Shaw today and gave them the polite but stern harangue about this whole new thing, and they upgraded me from regular Hi-Speed to Hi-Speed Extreme for $20 less a month than I was paying before. Hopefully 100gb should hold me, as I don't download too much from Steam.
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Jan 16, 2011 01:50
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Will that RFlow collector thing in DD-WRT allow me to monitor bandwidth by connected device? I'd like to know before I go through all the effort of setting it up, because just putting DD-WRT on there messed up things like iPad Netflix. Back to Tomato for now...
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Jan 16, 2011 01:59
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univbee posted:As someone who lives in Vancouver and is currently planning to move back to Montreal, this is a house of lies. Unless you're somehow allergic to snow and want it to be substituted for rain, which would make you insane If you know how much you typically download in a month, you might want to consider for ~$105 you can get 60/3 with 210GB down. I'm not sure I'd survive on 15mb down, but I never go above 150gb a month or so.
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Jan 16, 2011 02:55
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mik posted:If you know how much you typically download in a month, you might want to consider for ~$105 you can get 60/3 with 210GB down. I'm not sure I'd survive on 15mb down, but I never go above 150gb a month or so. I've gone over 200 gigs in a WEEK with 15 down here. Honestly, the download speed doesn't bother me at all within reason, especially since so few websites hit that speed. I'm happy with 15 down and TRUE 1 up (although 3 up would be pretty sweet) unmetered. Hell, I'll even throttle during the day if it's what the ISP wants (seriously ISPs, I can work for you if you'll let me, throw me a bone).
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Jan 16, 2011 05:42
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