Download limits on Broadband

Ian Robinson · #1 24-10-2009, 01:47 PM

I've it on good authority people in the USA get unlimited downloads/uploads (no surplus charges/shaping) with their plans for under 50USD.

Begs the question .... why is it that upload/download limits are applied here in Australia ?

Anyone here been caught out by exceeding their download / upload limits ? what happened ?

(I have a monthly limit of 29GB and I exceeded it this month, I've had my ADSL service shaped (is woefully slow right now .... so not worth while downloading large files until next month, I have heard horror stories of people getting monthly bills of thousands of $ when they exceeded their broadband monthly up/download limits.)

Kal (Andrew) · #2 24-10-2009, 02:16 PM

The fibre optic cables under the sea that connect australia to asia, and then onto the rest of the world, cost money, therefore providing a broadband connection with decent international bandwidth will cost more money in Australia compared to the US. Also, they have a much denser population market compared to Australia. Providing services in major centres like Sydney/Melbourne is offset by the costs of providing infrastructure to country areas.

acropolite (Phil) · #3 24-10-2009, 02:41 PM

What Andrew says is true to a point, but most countries throughout the world have cheaper rates than we do, IMO it's more about real competition (in the carrier market) or rather the lack of it.

mswhin63 (Malcolm) · #4 24-10-2009, 02:45 PM

Australia population does not allow for a cost effective infrastructure. Consequently there is not enough bandwith available in Australia and thus limits on data access.

My Bigpond is shaped @ 25G when it exceeds. So it doesn't cost me extra but is annoyingly slow.

As the technology grows in Oz the data bandwith increases with responsible ISP's like IINET and other whereas selfish money hungry Telstra and Optus providers continue to use the excuses. Hopefully the splitting of Telstra Whoesale and Retail may allows better competition and larger data access where necessary.

Kevnool (Kev) · #5 24-10-2009, 02:46 PM

When i go over 40 gig my speed just slows down to dail up speed.
No extra charges.

Cheers Kev.

[1ponders] (Paul) · #6 24-10-2009, 02:53 PM

How does anyone exceed 29gig in a month? I have 1 gig peak and 4 off peak and have never exceeded either. What do people download????

mswhin63 (Malcolm) · #7 24-10-2009, 02:57 PM

Astronomy video and podcasts.

Waxing_Gibbous (Peter) · #8 24-10-2009, 03:03 PM

Canada is in the same situation as Australia - huge country, few people and still manages to get GBPS broadband in the sticks at about 1/3 the cost of here. Even Kenya, Nigeria, Khazakstan and Lithuania all have faster, cheaper broadband than Austalia.
I don't know where Kal got the idea that there is infrastructure in county areas, our nearest transmitter is 100K away! Its not even a proper transmitter - just a relay station!
Apart from just out 'n out unregulated money-grubbing, one reason is that under the lpast gov't, there was a huge row over the public/private split, and whether competeing firms should pay for infrastructure. It also spent all its cash trying to buy-up or into foreign telcos and mobile co's.
Telstra, once a world leader in telecoms, stopped investing in high-speed

internet, and are now playing catch-up.
Another reason is competition and ownership of infrastructure. Most telcos abroad shoulder some burden of owning/maintaining exchanges, towers etc, which spreads the costs over several parties.
I get caught out every month. Usually going over 200% of my allowance. I have to remind myself that Telstra's MBPS means Mega-Bits
not Mega-Bytes!
Yeah. In short, its pretty outrageous, but we continue to pay the charges
so they'll continue to charge the rates.

Kal (Andrew) · #9 24-10-2009, 03:07 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Waxing_Gibbous

I don't know where Kal got the idea that there is infrastructure in county areas, our nearest transmitter is 100K away! Its not even a proper transmitter - just a relay station!

We're paying for the infrastructure that isn't even adequately being provided

mswhin63 (Malcolm) · #10 24-10-2009, 03:09 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Kal

We're paying for the infrastructure that isn't even adequately being provided

Tell me about it, I live in a 4 year old suburb and have the slowest broadband because Telstra install a RIM to save money.

Ian Robinson · #11 24-10-2009, 03:12 PM

wrt to the furfey about cost of copper network infrastructure. No reason why ADSL and ADSL2 can't be delivered via the copper in the power lines that go to just about every house (no matter were you are) in the country.

I put this situation down to outright highway robbery by the providers.

MrB (Simon) · #12 24-10-2009, 03:14 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Kal

We're paying for the infrastructure that isn't even adequately being provided

Quote:

Originally Posted by mswhin63

Tell me about it, I live in a 4 year old suburb and have the slowest broadband because Telstra install a RIM to save money.

Tell ME about it, I live in a major city(not far from Malcolm actually) and can't get any broadband.
Dialup or nuthin. Too far from the exchange.
Mobile Broadband? Don't make me laugh.
Besides it being a massive rip-off, I'm not even going to try it because my 3G mobile phone always says '2.5G' when I'm at home.

Ian Robinson · #13 24-10-2009, 03:16 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by mswhin63

Tell me about it, I live in a 4 year old suburb and have the slowest broadband because Telstra install a RIM to save money.

You'd think a new suburb (like your's would have had fibre to everyhouse installed as part of the installation of necessary infrastructure such as water, gas, electricity into the suburb).

Ian Robinson · #14 24-10-2009, 03:17 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Kevnool

When i go over 40 gig my speed just slows down to dail up speed.
No extra charges.

Cheers Kev.

Who's the provider and what plan is it ?

Ian Robinson · #15 24-10-2009, 03:21 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by [1ponders]

How does anyone exceed 29gig in a month? I have 1 gig peak and 4 off peak and have never exceeded either. What do people download????

There's the rub, I haven't downloaded over 29Gb , but when downloading torrents (movies, TV series eps) apparently you also upload as much or more data as part of the torrenting process.

I was told when I queried it I'd uploaded over 10Gb .... that was news to me.
I was told that is added to the downloads I've done.

My son also visited for a few days and was using my ADSL modem via the Lan cable (I think those online games he likes are upload heavy too).

I'll limit the Vuze upload speed to the slowest possible when I get unshaped in a few weeks. That should reduce the uploading heaps.

dpastern (Dave Pastern) · #16 24-10-2009, 03:24 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by [1ponders]

How does anyone exceed 29gig in a month? I have 1 gig peak and 4 off peak and have never exceeded either. What do people download????

Piracy. Plain and simple.

Dave

dpastern (Dave Pastern) · #17 24-10-2009, 03:29 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by MrB

Tell ME about it, I live in a major city(not far from Malcolm actually) and can't get any broadband.
Dialup or nuthin. Too far from the exchange.
Mobile Broadband? Don't make me laugh.
Besides it being a massive rip-off, I'm not even going to try it because my 3G mobile phone always says '2.5G' when I'm at home.

Unfortunately, with ADSL (and more especially, ADSL2+), distance rules. Anything more than around 4km cabling wise is going to be problematic with both noise and occupancy issues (not to mention attenuation). Telstra wholesale generally limits new connections - if you've applied for ADSL2+ and the speed is going to be less than a 1500 kbps connection, they'll reject it. If you're a certain distance or greater from the exchange, they'll automatically reject it too. Then there's pair gain (PGC) issues, RIM issues, etc. People take it for granted that they can get ADSL. The technology slows the further you are away from the exchange (it's just how it works, griping about it won't fix it or change it).

Dave

PS I work for an ISP - I see this all the time. And no, I work for a real ISP, not some lvl 1 craphead at Bigpond, sloptus etc that doesn't know what they're doing. I have full access to all our SIP servers, hosted webservers, hosted exchange server, sql dbase (both ms sql and mysql varieties), dns servers, and our core routers and switches (core router is a larger Redback, can serve up to 2 million connections, not a cheap piece of gear - I have full level 15 sysadmin access to said device, see how many bigpond techies have this level of access!).

dpastern (Dave Pastern) · #18 24-10-2009, 03:30 PM

As an aside, until the monopoly that is Telstra is broken down (retail and wholesale components), and the infrastructure is removed from Telstra's ownership and given back to the people, these problems will continue.

Dave

dpastern (Dave Pastern) · #19 24-10-2009, 03:31 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ian Robinson

There's the rub, I haven't downloaded over 29Gb , but when downloading torrents (movies, TV series eps) apparently you also upload as much or more data as part of the torrenting process.

I was told when I queried it I'd uploaded over 10Gb .... that was news to me.
I was told that is added to the downloads I've done.

My son also visited for a few days and was using my ADSL modem via the Lan cable (I think those online games he likes are upload heavy too).

I'll limit the Vuze upload speed to the slowest possible when I get unshaped in a few weeks. That should reduce the uploading heaps.

Ian - uploading doesn't count towards your download limit. If your ISP is counting your uploads, change ISPs, they are ripping you off.

If you've got a wireless modem, and you're using it wireless, make sure it's encrypted, preferably with WPA-PSK2 (not wep/wpa), so others can't piggyback and use your connection.

Dave

Dennis · #20 24-10-2009, 03:35 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by [1ponders]

How does anyone exceed 29gig in a month? I have 1 gig peak and 4 off peak and have never exceeded either. What do people download????

Hi Paul

We’re on a mere 12gig plan and have just reached 80% of our allocated limit due to viewing on-line Photoshop training videos from Lynda.com.

Upgrading from CS3 to CS4 gave me this 30 day free trial and I have been watching these very useful on-line tutorials for 3-4 hours at a time, several times a week. I hadn’t realised how much of my download bandwidth they chewed up!!!

Cheers

Dennis