Shaw Internet - Magical New Speeds and Lots-o-bandwidth, fickle geeks appeased

[theonlywhiteout]

then dont take the contract

telus internet price is 32 for 6.0 and 45 for 15.0 with any other telus service including a cellphone

the contract is to get a free xbox 360.

[Jimmy Stang]

Out of curiosity, I called Shaw to ask about this little bandwidth meter. What follows is what this particular agent told me, so right or wrong, take it with a grain of salt because you might get a different answer when you call in:

- The bandwidth meter cannot be manually/voluntarily activated. I asked a couple of times, and he said not to worry about my bandwidth and if I'm over they'll tell me. (I'd rather be able to see it myself, but I'm not going to beat a dead horse).
- It will show up once you go over your cap in a given billing cycle.
- You will not be charged for overages until you have exceeded your cap for your third consecutive month. I asked for clarification by using the example of going over for two months in a row, then under, over for two more, then under again, and he said that your tally is reset as soon as you have a month that you're under the cap.

And he was able to give me the low-fi bandwidth meter by having him read off what my usage was for the past few months. I did tell him that it would be easier if I could just view it myself... I was using around 40 gigs in August-September, spiked to 60 between mid-September and mid-October (probably me screwing around with Netflix because it was new). Now I seem to be on pace for about 50-60 or so gigs a month.

I'm not a heavy Netflix user by any means, and I have a 100GB cap that I'll be hard pressed to exceed. But I do predict that there will be a lot of noise from those on the high speed tier in approximately 3 months.

[zamler]

I just want to find out pricing on a comparable bundle. What, do I need a secret decoder ring? But Telus lists a 75gig bandwidth cap anyway. Lamers.

[Torture]

I have 3 roommates and one of them is a mad torrenter who believes you have to seed torrents. (Which sure I agree, as long as you're not killing the internet for your roomies.)

So now not only will my internet be slow 90% of the time but I'm going to pay more.

Excellent.

[DownhillGoat]

Originally Posted by Torture

I have 3 roommates and one of them is a mad torrenter who believes you have to seed torrents. (Which sure I agree, as long as you're not killing the internet for your roomies.)

So tell the roomate with the torrents to get his own account through the other ISP, and you and the other two share the ISP you have now.

[GoinAllTheWay]

I've been meaning to try Netflix but this is something to take into consideration. If I were to watch one movie over netflix, how much bandwidth would that use approximately?

Does netflix to hd?

[Jimmy Stang]

Originally Posted by GoinAllTheWay

I've been meaning to try Netflix but this is something to take into consideration. If I were to watch one movie over netflix, how much bandwidth would that use approximately?

Does netflix to hd?

A 1.5 hour movie in HD would be about 3 gigs. SD would be less, obviously, but I'm not sure by how much. It would probably be safe to assume about half of that.

[mykalberta]

Can people not logon to secure.shaw.ca and click on modem useage to see the amount they have used for this month and the previous months?

[Hack&Lube]

Originally Posted by mykalberta

Can people not logon to secure.shaw.ca and click on modem useage to see the amount they have used for this month and the previous months?

IIRC It doesn't work unless you've been previously flagged and even then it's not accurate.

[Russic]

Originally Posted by Torture

I have 3 roommates and one of them is a mad torrenter who believes you have to seed torrents. (Which sure I agree, as long as you're not killing the internet for your roomies.)

So now not only will my internet be slow 90% of the time but I'm going to pay more.

Excellent.

If you ask me Shaw could teach you a little lesson here. Your roomate probably uses up 90% of your bandwidth. Seems to me he should be paying for 90% of the internet bill (or all of the overage fees).

[mykalberta]

When I first asked about it 6ish years ago I thought they had me register the modem before it would work.

[Prototype]

Originally Posted by mykalberta

Can people not logon to secure.shaw.ca and click on modem useage to see the amount they have used for this month and the previous months?

Looks like you gave them a big F-U in August.

[Rathji]

Ignore - Same old table as before

[zamler]

Originally Posted by Prototype

Looks like you gave them a big F-U in August.

Yes, FU to your service provider, using a high speed service as it's intended. How dare the consumer do this!

Let's put it this way, in a bit over 24 hours, I can download about 60 Gbytes, give or take. So in one day, I can use what Shaw considers one month of usage. Or to put it another way, I can utilize their service to 1/30th capacity. I understand that no service is intended to be maxed out, all the time, but the point stands.

I reiterate, why offer blazing fast speeds if you can't use it? All it ends up being is pure marketing BS.

[mykalberta]

I do think that companies like NetFlix need to take some sort of responsibility vis a vi streaming either by compressing it along the network and then uncompressing it at the end user station or something to that effect.

Companies price service based on the average level of consumption. All these new online services have changed average level of consumption.

I am sure buffet restraunt type places are priced the same way, they dont expect every patron to be a member of the Klumps.

Is it not similar to cell phone service, cell service isnt designed for everyone to be online at once, if you are you get the 9-11 no service messages.

[zamler]

Originally Posted by mykalberta

I do think that companies like NetFlix need to take some sort of responsibility vis a vi streaming either by compressing it along the network and then uncompressing it at the end user station or something to that effect.

The video is already highly compressed, no further compression (beyond maybe 1%) is possible. They can lower the bitrate of the video further but then quality will suffer. Codecs have become much better over the last few years, so what you are getting is approaching the practical limits of perceptual compression.

Disclaimer: I don't know what codec(s) these services use, so it is possible they could switch to something more efficient.

[photon]

Originally Posted by mykalberta

I do think that companies like NetFlix need to take some sort of responsibility vis a vi streaming either by compressing it along the network and then uncompressing it at the end user station or something to that effect.

Well considering an uncompressed HD video would run into the hundreds of GB per hour, it's apparent that Netflix is already doing some compression on the video to get it down to a few GB per hour.

Netflix pays for the infrastructure to deliver their content, so it's in their best interests to have the best compression they can for the quality they want to deliver, from a basic costs point of view.

[sclitheroe]

Originally Posted by mykalberta

I do think that companies like NetFlix need to take some sort of responsibility vis a vi streaming either by compressing it along the network and then uncompressing it at the end user station or something to that effect.

Netflix already pays for the internet connectivity and bandwidth their servers require. This is how the internet works - everyone pays their own way to get on board.

Saying that netflix needs to take financial or technical responsibility for end-user traffic is like saying Panasonic should take responsibility for the huge power draw on Enmax's network that their plasma TV's are causing.

[MickMcGeough]

Originally Posted by zamler

The video is already highly compressed, no further compression (beyond maybe 1%) is possible. They can lower the bitrate of the video further but then quality will suffer. Codecs have become much better over the last few years, so what you are getting is approaching the practical limits of perceptual compression.

Disclaimer: I don't know what codec(s) these services use, so it is possible they could switch to something more efficient.

Netflix uses VC1AP at 2600kbps and 3800kbps for HD.

The quality is good but that seems a tad high to me; I've only watched one HD movie on Netflix but it did not look as good as a lot of 4000kbps x264 encodes that I've got.

[Bertuzzied]

hmmm one month i uploaded 250gigs a few years back and then i noticed my internet slow down significantly.

I told them i was using a wireless router for the first time and it must have been my neighbors doing all the uploading/downloading. hehe

I have never had a problem since.