[Merged] NTL - New 1MB / 5GB Cap - should I subscribe @ 300k with NO CAP ?

Originally Posted by ianathuth

How do you know that NTL aren't doing market research? Have you ever stopped to think that NTL are giving what most customers want and are happy with, not what a very small minority of customers demand, many of which they would be better without.

I could not have said that any better well said .

I am waiting to see what the final outcome is then i will make my mind up. Untill then i have better things to spend my time on.

However some info so far.

I have been monitoring my connection for the last month using mrtg and can tell you that i used 35.4 gig for the month and as i will be on the 3 meg option i think i will be ok.

I have 3 PC's connected with at least one user on most of the time. I stream video on broadband plus and download TV's ep when i need to. I have 3 teenagers in the house who do what most teens do with there connection.

I agree different users will use different levels but i considered myself a heavy user.

Looking at what some download might be that i am not a heavy user

[MatTman]

WHAT THE HELL!!!!!! 1mb /5gb per month....... thats F**King Rediculous, are NTL smoking crack to be coming up with such unbelieveably unreasonable bandwidth caps?

3mb /40gb... yet again truly pathetic, NTL are shafting themselves and i will take my £120 per month somewhere else.

[ian@huth]

Originally Posted by MatTman

WHAT THE HELL!!!!!! 1mb /5gb per month....... thats F**King Rediculous, are NTL smoking crack to be coming up with such unbelieveably unreasonable bandwidth caps?

5 Gb per month is ample for most users who want an always on connection without their phone line being tied up. They probably don't need a 1 Mb connection but have that speed available to speed up the odd download that they do. And they get that for only £17.99 per month, a price at which some of the ADSL competition only gives 1 or 2 Gb a month usage.

Originally Posted by MatTman

3mb /40gb... yet again truly pathetic, NTL are shafting themselves and i will take my £120 per month somewhere else.

40 Gb per month is a reasonable allowance even for heavy users which people such as Bill C think they are as he posted above. What would you rather have, 3Mb with a 40 Gb allowance or 1.5 Mb with a 40 Gb allowance? I know that the answer will probably be 3 Mb with no restriction, but are you willing to pay for that level of service?

[Mauldor]

I think tbh we are still missing the point:

A UBR has only so much Bandwidth - if enough people hog the line on lets say the 1.5mbit then it will cause the rest of the people connected to either have slower download or bad pings in gaming. Upload bandwidth is rarer than download bandwidth. Tarring the enitre UK with the same brush is not good though, for example there might well be lots of bandwidth left over in my neck of the woods while a major city (nottingham say) might have it all used up a lot of the time. This I can understand, so you would think then the last thing you want to be doing is increasing the bandwidth avail to customers if there is not enough to go around in the first place.

This was the reason for the "soft" cap, if a lot of people in the same area rang up about slow speeds etc - they can identify by whatever means a person in that area as a heavy user (maybe 10 of them lets say) and write them a nice letter.

Now what is been proposed (and yes its only that) is that you get XX per month - this in effect does not stop the problem above - For exmaple lets say Im on the new 3mbit - I can thus spend 5 days in a row (as a example) downloading my quota, people in the area ring up Support as they cannot go online as pings are so bad in games and there speeds are slow, cos me and a bunch of others are all using the bandwidth.

All I want to know - what is the end goal here? Yes we have covered this is Major detail many times with a shortage of Bandwidth yet each time we are giving more and more? Maybe Im missing the point?

[ian@huth]

Originally Posted by Mauldor

I think tbh we are still missing the point:
<snip

Giving people more bandwidth is no problem if they continue to do what they did before they got it. Just the same as if I swap my car for one with an higher top speed doesn't mean I will drive faster or travel further.

In a way giving customers twice the speed could mean that they are only on line with the possibility of affecting others use for half the time if all they are doing is downloading a large file.

The big question is will users alter their usage pattern when they get this extra speed or not. If having twice the speed that you now have means you will download significantly more, what is this extra download?

[nj2112]

I've been thinking how people might alter their net habits with a hard cap in place and I think we might see a new phenomena.

Users may fall into two catagories (broadly speaking).

Type A
Use bandwidth freely at the start of a capping period until a certain proportion of the allowance is used then moderate usage for the rest of the period.

Type B
Moderate useage at the start of a capping period then as the end of the period approaches increase usage, a use it or lose scenario.

I speculate that there may be increased utilisation of network capacity around the end/start of capping periods. I wonder how well the infrastructure will cope and will we soon see regular end/start of capping period slowdowns.

Also with the soft cap there was/is some incentive to "fly under the radar" by downloading in off peak periods, if you exceed the usage guideline but don't impact on other users maybe you wont get a letter.
Conversely with a hard cap you have a set limit so there is no real incentive to use at off peak times, usage will be when most convenient, probably resulting in higher peak time usage.

I'm just speculating but couple the end/start increase and the peak time increase and maybe we'll see some quite bad times around the end/start of the month.

Just a couple of thoughts.

[Mauldor]

I was after really the technical arguement of a Cap, no use going over ground which has been covered about how much people download and why as this is not getting us anywhere.

Using the mobile phone market as the best example (as cars dont really compare) - they limit you to a set ammount of calls per month (like the Cap) and anything over this is charged extra. If you had 200 mins left over and nothing was carried over, then 9/10 people will use them up best way they can.
The mobile phone market though as to compete against all the others, no good one offering you 100 mins a month for £25 when your next competitor is offering 500 mins for the same price.

This is what I am trying to get at really, every single providor including Telewest Have a cap yes but not on all of there services they sell. Telewest as a good example use the same equipment yet for some reason they dont feel the need to start limiting - nor do any of the ADSL people out there.

At the end of the day its fairly simple what might happen - NTL say bring in a Hard Cap across there entire range, XX number of people will move if they can to another providor. NTL *Might* later on think they have dont the wrong thing and thus drop the cap on the top tiers but they wont get the people back. It might be a small blip in your eyes but people normally speak to each other in many means (including forums) - good example is I suggest to anybody that asks me not to go with:

AOL
BT
FreeServe

As on the whole you can get better, cheaper else where.. It might not happen overnight but give it time and it will soon come to light, which at the end of the day effect people working in NTL as this could include cutting down staff.

[mcmanic]

Yes some good thoughts there nj2112, i for one will wait untill last week of every month and download my full 40gig of tv shows ect,ect regardless of the time of day or having a impact on other users as i will be within my monthly quota, having a newsgroup account with 28days retention is great for that sort of thing, whereas at the moment i normally leave pc on at night where there is little impact to other users.

Don't think Ntl have really thought this through, we could hold a national download week maybe if they go for a perm cap system, lol

[eshaq786]

National download week? Sounds like a good idea.

[Chrysalis]

To answer some points made and to raise new points.

1 - It is not easy for some people to simply change provider eg. Landlord might not allow BT line(my case), could be no ADSL in area, could be out of ADSL range, might not be household owner and as such cant decide on telco provider. NTL have effective cable monopoly which I do not agree with, BT are forced to have competition I cannot see how it is fair telewest and NTL dont compete in same areas as they obviously both provide largely different levels of service.

2 - ISP's such as AAisp have caps but they are time of day triggered so you have a monthly allowance for peak time downloading but in early morning there is no limit, why can't NTL implement something similiar.

3 - Most ADSL isp's who have a cap such as metronet and plusnet have a price cap at which point the connection becomes unmetered, the only 2 ADSL isp's who dont do this are wannadoo and BT surprise surpise this is who NTL compare themselves to.

4 - Market research is bull****, fact is a lot of customers are not technically minded so as such don't use their connections to their potential for isp's this is a free gift since they are paying something they barely use. Those who do want to use it are getting labled as abusers (not talking about 24/7 talking about the people caught in the middle)

[daxx]

A few years ago I, along with a few others, were paying £50 for a 1m connection with NTL. Then came the price reduction down to £35, great a £15 'saving'.

I have said all along that I will pay for whatever speed I need be it capped or uncapped (if given a choice).

Given the immenent release of a couple more BW hungry offering from NTL and the new teirs offering, perhaps it is time (yet again <sigh>) that NTL top dogs get a few emails pointing them at the various 'cap' discussions here and elsewhere (if such other places exist ) and they take note of what the 'tech savvy' users would like. After all it is the membership of this forum, that, by helping the non techy, enable those people to become more aware of the more advanced nature of BB and what eventually is possible and indirectly point those users towards a higher costing teir.

Without the input from these forums (if they listen) then NTL would have us all on the 300 teir and just downloading emails with a bit of browsing thrown in. An ideal situation for NTL bandwidth, but a very stagnant and dying customer base as those that become more 'techy' will want 'better' offerings.

NTL are here to make a profit (get out of debt) and any company must continue to offer what its customers require at a price that is dictated by what the customer sees as a 'fair price'. We have all seen over the past couple of years various ISP's being 'bought out' or dissapearing from either being 'overpriced' or by not being 'not cost effective'.

The answers is quite simple, for those wanting an 'uncapped' service simply revert back to the pre-price reduction prices of a couple of years ago, unfortunatley the only one I can remember is the teir I was on, £50 for 1Meg. I personally have no qualms or argument with NTL charging me this price for an uncapped service, this was the amount budgeted for my 'internet access' and considering that I will (if this is adopted) be getting a 200% download speed increase for no extra cost, if NTL choose to increase my upload speed then fine something else to weigh as a plus point.

At the end of the day if I don't like what NTL are offering then I will simply 'vote with my wallet' and find a supplier who has what I require speedwise or service wise, and not waste my time forever whingeing on about what 'alternative suppliers' are offering. I'll just go and 'buy' from them

If I want it, whatever 'it' may be I'll go out and get it, simple as that.
If what I want is not available to me by reason of my locality then it's my tough luck, I'll simply have to keep on looking till I find it in my area.
If I can't afford it then that is my problem, not the suppliers. Its my money and it is up to me to decide how its spent/budgeted.

The 'if's' argument could go on forever as could the answers but what is the point, this forum has been there many times before and if their were T shirts given out for all the 'cap' related threads in this current and previous incarnations of the board then most of the membership would be wearing them, or using them for dusters .

At the end of the day it is a 'wait and see' situation, if I'm not happy with whats offered then I'll be off, no whinging or moaning, just gone to an alternative supplier. Simple as that.

[MatTman]

Originally Posted by ianathuth

5 Gb per month is ample for most users who want an always on connection without their phone line being tied up. They probably don't need a 1 Mb connection but have that speed available to speed up the odd download that they do. And they get that for only £17.99 per month, a price at which some of the ADSL competition only gives 1 or 2 Gb a month usage.



40 Gb per month is a reasonable allowance even for heavy users which people such as Bill C think they are as he posted above. What would you rather have, 3Mb with a 40 Gb allowance or 1.5 Mb with a 40 Gb allowance? I know that the answer will probably be 3 Mb with no restriction, but are you willing to pay for that level of service?

3mb will be used up fast, you'd be suprised how much extra Data windows likes to transfer when you have the bandwidth, spyware Ad-ware Stealth Warez that many Comp newbs dont know how to combat will feel it..

3mb should be more 50 gig to allow for the days when some alot of users likely will go over 1 gig per day, especially those on Networks.

[ian@huth]

Originally Posted by MatTman

3mb will be used up fast, you'd be suprised how much extra Data windows likes to transfer when you have the bandwidth, spyware Ad-ware Stealth Warez that many Comp newbs dont know how to combat will feel it..

3mb should be more 50 gig to allow for the days when some alot of users likely will go over 1 gig per day, especially those on Networks.

I don't know how you work that out?

My own feeling about networks is that they should be subject to the same allowance as a single user setup or you pay more for a higher allowance. If you go to an all you can eat diner you don't expect to be able to take a couple of friends along and all eat for the same price as one person.

I will be on the 3M service, and will get nowhere even close to 40GB a month.

Originally Posted by Paul M

I will be on the 3M service, and will get nowhere even close to 40GB a month.

I will be on the 2M & will be nowhere close to 30GB pm, well when my son moves out, anyway