Gizmodo: bandwidth cap

T-Mobile Removes 1GB 3G Data Cap for G1 Android Phone

Jason Chen — Wed, 24 Sep 2008 19:01:47 EDT

T-Mobile's just rolled back on their 1GB usage cap on their 3G plans for upcoming G1 Android customers, instead going to a hold-up-while-we-figure-this-out route. The statement they give now states that they can reduce throughput for "a small fraction" of users who are using too much data, but exact terms and limits are still being reviewed before they're finalized. Statement after the jump.

Our goal, when the T-Mobile G1 becomes available in October, is to provide affordable, high-speed data service allowing customers to experience the full data capabilities of the device and our 3G network. At the same time, we have a responsibility to provide the best network experience for all of our customers so we reserve the right to temporarily reduce data throughput for a small fraction of our customers who have excessive or disproportionate usage that interferes with our network performance or our ability to provide quality service to all of our customers.

We removed the 1GB soft limit from our policy statement, and we are confident that T-Mobile G1 customers will enjoy the high speed of data access over our 3G network. The specific terms for our new data plans are still being reviewed and once they are final we will be certain to share this broadly with current customers and potential new customers.

Sprint Finally Makes Good On 3G Data Capping

Jason Chen — Tue, 05 Aug 2008 14:04:35 EDT

Sprint's finally pulled the trigger on their data capping policy, limiting users to 5GB a month or 300MB while on off-network roaming. Our tipster says the note after the jump appeared on his most recent bill, and will start the cappage in 30 days. They now join the Verizon and AT&T networks at 5GB, but Sprint is still our favorite for field work on the go.

"Effective in 30 days, Sprint reserves the right to limit throughput speeds or amount of data transferred and to deny, terminate, modify, or suspend service if usage exceeds 5 GB/month in total or 300 MB/month while roaming off network."

[Thanks Brett!]

Comcast Elaborates Slightly on Unlimited Cable Internet Caps: 90GB to 150GB

Jason Chen — Sun, 16 Sep 2007 12:15:33 EDT

Although Comcast advertises an unlimited cable-internet use policy, many heavy downloaders have run into an invisible cap, which triggers a call from Comcast's Security Department that flags their account for excessive use. The second time this happens, you're booted altogether—under the reason of hampering connection quality for your neighbors. The number 300GB has been tossed around in forums lately as the cap Comcast uses, but it could be closer to about 90 to 150GB.

A spokesperson for the cable company said that excessive use qualifies as anybody who downloads "30,000 songs, 250,000 pictures, or 13 million emails in a month." Since it's hard to quantify emails and pictures in terms of size, we'll have to judge by songs, which are usually about 3MB to 5MB depending on how high it's encoded.

But Comcast doesn't actually tell people exactly what this cap is, leading users to sit in fear of whether or not they'll go over and be booted. Although it's mostly heavy BitTorrent users who have been subject to this, the rise of ABC, NBC, Amazon, iTunes and NetFlix video services has put regular people who really enjoy TV into the same group as well. [Gamdaily via Kotaku]