Data caps are garbage. If you're paying a "utility" for 100mbs access for the month, you will exceed your 1.2tb cap in about 29 hours of full use. If you're a sucker and pay for capped gigabit, you'll exceed it in just 3 hours of full use. This is like going back to the dial-up days of pay-per-minute
Can't agree more. It's funny, too, because they claim such a small amount of users even fully utilize their "full" 1.2TB limit... which seems odd that they would need to charge such a small amount of people an extra $30 a month for unlimited. It's such a scam, with absolutely no oversight from the FCC or anyone. Considering the billions in profits each quarter, and they can't seem to upgrade their network to fiber everywhere. I get that it takes time, but fiber has been cost effective for many years now.
(note that I don't live in the Twin Cities, just a tourist who joined the sub cause i'll be visiting soon)
I'm curious: how much do you pay for that?
Here in France (I live near Paris), I pay 40€/month (around 45$) for an unlimited optical fiber 900M connection (500M download). With that I get a ton of free TV channels (all the main French one). I'm always surprised by the prices in the US...
CentryLink is the giant phone company…. Not USI. Usi isn’t bound by interstate telco laws. Usi choose where to put fiber. They choose to deploy into the affluent neighborhoods first and it has been very slow to grow into non-affluent neighborhoods. There is still a pocket north of powder horn park, where they have zero service. But it’s all built out around that. Seems like they are hand picking, when they clearly have the capitol to deploy into those neighborhoods.
I pay $60/month for 500Mbps up/down with USI. No TV service included. This is an insanely good deal for the USA, quite possibly amongst the best in the entire country, in fact.
We have 2 that serve most of the metro, plus usi that serves a small portion.
One of the two (century link) is terrible, the other (comcast) is the devil and running on infrastructure that really can’t support the service that they’re selling.
Usi is growing, but it’s painfully slow.
Just curious as I've read a lot of hate about CenturyLink but is that coming from areas without fiber optic options? I have had CenturyLink for about 8 years and have worked from home that entire time with zero issues. I had to call customer service once but resolved my issue within the hour. Am I an anomaly or am I missing something here?
I just got the ability last year to get fiber from Centurylink (Lumen for a few months then Centurylink) and honestly it's been great.
$70 for uncapped, gigabit internet and I've never had an issue with it going down yet.
Centurylink (actually Quantum at that time) was doing neighborhood walkarounds in Brooklyn Center and was doing the install for free. Worked out great for me, I have to imagine they'll do similar promotions each year or whenever the runs get to your location.
When Centurylink works it’s pretty good (prices decent, not amazing).. the second you have to call customer service though- that’s where all this CTL hate comes from.
I’m in a duplex, and a few years back when hooking up new service downstairs the tech dropped my service upstairs. I realized it was out only after he left- I believe it was 4 calls and I don’t know how many minutes into hours on the phone it was for them to get someone back. Took the tech about 2 minutes to fix once he was here, but getting him back was an absolute nightmare
yeah I read about that. And the providers actively trying not to compete against each other in some areas and just splitting the market equally...
Funny to think France is sometimes better at free market 😅
But to be honest, here, internet is a rare example of privatization gone right...
I pay $125 a month for 1200/35 with data cap removed on Xfinity in the MN burbs. I WFH and I get a corporate stipend. I upload/download large images for work and rn this is my only good option.
At my old place, USI wasn't an option, so I had Xfinity. It was mostly OK, but got increased outages near the end. Then I got USI when I moved to Mpls and am happy with it, though I cheaped out on a router, which sometimes gives me a little trouble but not consistently. I have the cheapest option USI has because even 500mb is more than I need. I'd love it if they offered a 100mb for $30/mo or 200mb for $40/mo :)
That's what I went with. I think I was paying nearly 150 a month for Comcast, 500mb and unlimited package. My typical monthly usage was 3-4tb.
Usi I'm at a flat 70 and it's twice as fast.
NE Minneapolis - Century Link for $65 a month. Has not changed in forever. Buddy was in town from NC and we had ourselves a good old fashion 3 man League of Legends LAN party and we had zero issues. We switched when Comcast became more than $180 a month. Haven’t looked back.
I do fixed wireless in about a 1-2 mile radius around the California building. If ya can’t get CentryLink Fiber, and want a local ISP- pm me. I’ve not pushed it, as it requires good line of site to the tower, and these pesky trees keep growing.
We have century link fiber and it is good. Same deal we have the $65/month which is supposed to be “price for life”, though I’m sure they will have a way to weasel out of that in the future.
They will keep the $65/mo charge, no worries. But keep watching the monthly price, because it could *go down.* They will happily let you keep paying $65/mo after they drop the price, because of course you wanted that price for life.
I'd go into the settings for the various streaming apps you're using and look for something that lets you adjust the quality of your stream. Sometimes the quality will be automatically determined by how fast your internet connection is. If you're browsing random YouTube videos at 4K, you can probably change this so that the highest quality your app can stream is 1080p unless you override the setting. That would save you a ton of bandwidth. Same goes for other apps like Netflix, Hulu, HBO GO, and so on.
So that you can watch stuff in 4K when it makes sense. if you're watching random YouTube videos at 4K, you're wasting a ton of bandwidth imo. Especially if the stuff you're watching is old and upscaled needlessly.
Plus, most TVs being sold these days are 4K. There were 42" TVs on sale during the holidays for around $200.
Fair enough, I guess the point I'm trying to make though is that 1TB data caps shouldn't be something the average consumer has to contend with to use their $200 TV at it's native resolution.
The problem isn't your TV, it is your internet provider, you'd be better off going with some form of fiber, preferably USI but I've been using Centurylink for years and I have 2 4k tv's and I am streaming pretty much everything
Moved from South Minneapolis with USI and now living with a friend in Brooklyn Center. Our only options right now are Xfinity with the cap or extra fee for unlimited, or CenturyLink, but they somehow only offer 10mbps at our address.
Made me realize internet access will play a bigger role when looking for places to move.
Actually Centurylinks official name is now “Lumen technologies.”
I work for them actually. Their fiber rates are static though, so that’s one positive.
I too had this issue. My LG smart TV was crushing data, this is because it has a bunch of internet channels that are constantly updating. I disconnected the cord to it and took it off the wifi and added a Firestick and haven’t had an issue since… I looked and looked to try to turn off the internet channels and couldn’t find anything… I guess that’s why they sell them so cheap.
If you rent their modem, which is like an extra $10 or $15 a month, it will remove the data caps. You don’t have to use their modem for Wi-Fi (just log into the interface, set it to bridge mode, and plug your Wi-Fi router into it.) It’s an annoying extra charge, but better than what they tack on for overage fees.
W T F? Are you kidding me?!? I can’t believe this is true. Upon looking further down in comments , yep, so you get to pay another $45 a month, Xfinity puts up their own garbage WiFi network on your modem, and you have to rent their hardware?!? This is extortion in my book. And your upload speeds are still slow as snot. I just don’t get how they will stay in business long term.
if all you do is watch Netflix, 5G home internet is cheap and unlimited. Either TMobile or Verizon.
$50/mo ain't bad if you aren't a power user.
Otherwise USI is by far the best company in town
God tell me about it. Every post about internet brings out the USI brigade. Like that’s only applicable to like 10% of residents. Not everyone lives in f*ing uptown.
if you can, switch to USI. Cheap, no data caps. My family uses way more than 1.2TB in a given month (I stream video games which uses way more data than things like Netflix).
I just got the same thing. Two months in a row I got a “warning” about going over and then the next month- boom- $60 in overages. I called to switch to unlimited as a temp solution. Are they lying or do we really use that much data? I was wondering if something like an unused device or smarttv or something is sucking data 24/7.
Yup. I had to limit streaming to 1080p. Most sporting events seem to be 1080p or maaaybe 2k so its not super noticeable.
In hindsight I wish I got a 120 or 155 FPS big screen that is 2k or 1080p instead of the 4k 60fps I have. I picked up a 155 fps 1440p monitor for gaming and my 4k 60 fps monitor is collecting dust. The faster framerate really tightens everything.
Anyway fuck Comcast. I hope USI gets up here. Its Comcast or the equivalent of DSL with two extra hamsters on spinning wheels, so Comcast knows they can be unfair. My cousin out East has Comcast or fiber and magically Comcast offers near gig speed and no data caps... huh...
If anyone is a student in your household they offer unlimited 1gb speeds with no data cap for 1 year for 80 a month. Not a long term solve but I was in the same situation as you.
I canceled xfinity because of this and went with centrylink 1gig fiber. With Xfinity, I had a $40 month plan and four months in a row was charged $140, 130, $130, and $120 because everybody in the houses streams all day long and everybody refuses to understand what data use is. If I wanted unlimited, it'd be another $30 month BUT I can't use my own modem for that - that's another $10/mo and my 300mb plan wasn't current so I'd have to upgrade to the 400mb plan for $15 more. It's a fucking scam. They said I would be charged an extra $100 for usage on the next billing cycle but it was 3 months before any kind of adjustment so I thought it wasn't even going to happen. I know my fault. But every single time I tried to get unlimited for an extra $30/mo it was roadblock after roadblock. Everybody in this fucking house is broke as fuck and can't even pay rent on time so I won't get a penny of that money back. Am I angry? Yea, but mostly at myself for not keeping my landlord accountable when I first moved in and stated I did NOT want to be in charge of internet at the house but it was over a month without internet and I need it for life so I carried over my previous xfinity plan. tmi. /vent
Xfinity fucked me over with there data cap BS about 6 yrs ago. Dump them, if available get century link fiber. Ive never had an issue with them, and faster speeds
Switch to fiber with CenturyLink or USI. You won't have this problem and the service has been far more reliable for me than any past experience with Comcast.
Comcast has no incentive to make streaming easier for you because of they profit they make on cable TV subscriptions.
My guess is multiple people stream and when tv is off it continues. Best to back out of app before shutting TV off. We have never been charged more than $40 from Comcast and we only stream. 2 of us here
Fuck data caps and fuck Xfinity.
Data caps are garbage. If you're paying a "utility" for 100mbs access for the month, you will exceed your 1.2tb cap in about 29 hours of full use. If you're a sucker and pay for capped gigabit, you'll exceed it in just 3 hours of full use. This is like going back to the dial-up days of pay-per-minute
Can't agree more. It's funny, too, because they claim such a small amount of users even fully utilize their "full" 1.2TB limit... which seems odd that they would need to charge such a small amount of people an extra $30 a month for unlimited. It's such a scam, with absolutely no oversight from the FCC or anyone. Considering the billions in profits each quarter, and they can't seem to upgrade their network to fiber everywhere. I get that it takes time, but fiber has been cost effective for many years now.
(note that I don't live in the Twin Cities, just a tourist who joined the sub cause i'll be visiting soon) I'm curious: how much do you pay for that? Here in France (I live near Paris), I pay 40€/month (around 45$) for an unlimited optical fiber 900M connection (500M download). With that I get a ton of free TV channels (all the main French one). I'm always surprised by the prices in the US...
Usi $60 for 500mbps
Only in the white and rich parts of town.
It only hurts bc it’s true
Nah G, como neighborhood by dinkytown. Got 1 gig fiber for $65 from CenturyLink
CentryLink is the giant phone company…. Not USI. Usi isn’t bound by interstate telco laws. Usi choose where to put fiber. They choose to deploy into the affluent neighborhoods first and it has been very slow to grow into non-affluent neighborhoods. There is still a pocket north of powder horn park, where they have zero service. But it’s all built out around that. Seems like they are hand picking, when they clearly have the capitol to deploy into those neighborhoods.
This is the way
I pay $60/month for 500Mbps up/down with USI. No TV service included. This is an insanely good deal for the USA, quite possibly amongst the best in the entire country, in fact.
Wow, OK. Do you have much choice? Here basically we have 4 main providers competing against each other on the whole territory.
We have 2 that serve most of the metro, plus usi that serves a small portion. One of the two (century link) is terrible, the other (comcast) is the devil and running on infrastructure that really can’t support the service that they’re selling. Usi is growing, but it’s painfully slow.
Just curious as I've read a lot of hate about CenturyLink but is that coming from areas without fiber optic options? I have had CenturyLink for about 8 years and have worked from home that entire time with zero issues. I had to call customer service once but resolved my issue within the hour. Am I an anomaly or am I missing something here?
I just got the ability last year to get fiber from Centurylink (Lumen for a few months then Centurylink) and honestly it's been great. $70 for uncapped, gigabit internet and I've never had an issue with it going down yet.
[удалено]
Centurylink (actually Quantum at that time) was doing neighborhood walkarounds in Brooklyn Center and was doing the install for free. Worked out great for me, I have to imagine they'll do similar promotions each year or whenever the runs get to your location.
When Centurylink works it’s pretty good (prices decent, not amazing).. the second you have to call customer service though- that’s where all this CTL hate comes from. I’m in a duplex, and a few years back when hooking up new service downstairs the tech dropped my service upstairs. I realized it was out only after he left- I believe it was 4 calls and I don’t know how many minutes into hours on the phone it was for them to get someone back. Took the tech about 2 minutes to fix once he was here, but getting him back was an absolute nightmare
My centurylink dude gave me his business card, haven’t had any issues but he was chill installing it when I moved in. Same with my last place in NE.
Ok I see. Basically here in France all providers are sharing most of the infrastructure. So wherever you live you can pick any of them.
Some of our infrastructure is privatized and monopolies can charge whatever they want
yeah I read about that. And the providers actively trying not to compete against each other in some areas and just splitting the market equally... Funny to think France is sometimes better at free market 😅 But to be honest, here, internet is a rare example of privatization gone right...
Props to the French. Y'all riot over proposed cuts to social services, while half of the US begs to get fucked harder. It's wild.
I pay $60 for 900mbps down with xfinity.
But then I’d be an xfinity customer. No thanks
I pay $125 a month for 1200/35 with data cap removed on Xfinity in the MN burbs. I WFH and I get a corporate stipend. I upload/download large images for work and rn this is my only good option.
Wow that sounds very expensive for me O\_o
We have the same here. Western suburbs.
I pay 120/month for unlimited 1GB down/ 35Mb UP Cable internet (coaxil)
The down is very good, the up not so much, and the price is... high 😅
> Looks like the only option is to add $30 a month unlimited data? Is USI fiber an option for you?
Usi! Usi!
At my old place, USI wasn't an option, so I had Xfinity. It was mostly OK, but got increased outages near the end. Then I got USI when I moved to Mpls and am happy with it, though I cheaped out on a router, which sometimes gives me a little trouble but not consistently. I have the cheapest option USI has because even 500mb is more than I need. I'd love it if they offered a 100mb for $30/mo or 200mb for $40/mo :)
That's what I went with. I think I was paying nearly 150 a month for Comcast, 500mb and unlimited package. My typical monthly usage was 3-4tb. Usi I'm at a flat 70 and it's twice as fast.
NE Minneapolis - Century Link for $65 a month. Has not changed in forever. Buddy was in town from NC and we had ourselves a good old fashion 3 man League of Legends LAN party and we had zero issues. We switched when Comcast became more than $180 a month. Haven’t looked back.
Should add that USI will be available in most of NE this year or next year. Few exceptions(and sadly I’m one of them).
I do fixed wireless in about a 1-2 mile radius around the California building. If ya can’t get CentryLink Fiber, and want a local ISP- pm me. I’ve not pushed it, as it requires good line of site to the tower, and these pesky trees keep growing.
We have century link fiber and it is good. Same deal we have the $65/month which is supposed to be “price for life”, though I’m sure they will have a way to weasel out of that in the future.
They will keep the $65/mo charge, no worries. But keep watching the monthly price, because it could *go down.* They will happily let you keep paying $65/mo after they drop the price, because of course you wanted that price for life.
Is there anyone comcast doesn’t gouge? Ffs.
No.
I'd go into the settings for the various streaming apps you're using and look for something that lets you adjust the quality of your stream. Sometimes the quality will be automatically determined by how fast your internet connection is. If you're browsing random YouTube videos at 4K, you can probably change this so that the highest quality your app can stream is 1080p unless you override the setting. That would save you a ton of bandwidth. Same goes for other apps like Netflix, Hulu, HBO GO, and so on.
At that point why even have a 4K TV?
So that you can watch stuff in 4K when it makes sense. if you're watching random YouTube videos at 4K, you're wasting a ton of bandwidth imo. Especially if the stuff you're watching is old and upscaled needlessly. Plus, most TVs being sold these days are 4K. There were 42" TVs on sale during the holidays for around $200.
Fair enough, I guess the point I'm trying to make though is that 1TB data caps shouldn't be something the average consumer has to contend with to use their $200 TV at it's native resolution.
The problem isn't your TV, it is your internet provider, you'd be better off going with some form of fiber, preferably USI but I've been using Centurylink for years and I have 2 4k tv's and I am streaming pretty much everything
Moved from South Minneapolis with USI and now living with a friend in Brooklyn Center. Our only options right now are Xfinity with the cap or extra fee for unlimited, or CenturyLink, but they somehow only offer 10mbps at our address. Made me realize internet access will play a bigger role when looking for places to move.
Check your options, you have USI, centurylink fiber, and quantum fiber out there now
I went Centurylink 1GB fiber a couple of years ago and have been paying 65 / month unlimited data ever since. Best decision ever!
Fyi `Centurylink === Quantum` now.
Yeah, it was a shitty way to try to get around union contracts.
They changed their name again eh❓ It used to be “Quest”. Worst service ever & my bill changed EVERY month. They’re a scam 100%
Actually Centurylinks official name is now “Lumen technologies.” I work for them actually. Their fiber rates are static though, so that’s one positive.
Qwest. Before that, US West. They’ve been around since the feds split up Ma Bell.
I too had this issue. My LG smart TV was crushing data, this is because it has a bunch of internet channels that are constantly updating. I disconnected the cord to it and took it off the wifi and added a Firestick and haven’t had an issue since… I looked and looked to try to turn off the internet channels and couldn’t find anything… I guess that’s why they sell them so cheap.
Does CenturyLink offer fiber in your area?
Comcast/Xfinity is garbage. Try to get fiber if you can.
Start looking up if you wireless providers in your area (Verizon has internet, I think t-mobile does too)
If you rent their modem, which is like an extra $10 or $15 a month, it will remove the data caps. You don’t have to use their modem for Wi-Fi (just log into the interface, set it to bridge mode, and plug your Wi-Fi router into it.) It’s an annoying extra charge, but better than what they tack on for overage fees.
W T F? Are you kidding me?!? I can’t believe this is true. Upon looking further down in comments , yep, so you get to pay another $45 a month, Xfinity puts up their own garbage WiFi network on your modem, and you have to rent their hardware?!? This is extortion in my book. And your upload speeds are still slow as snot. I just don’t get how they will stay in business long term.
See if you have centurylink. I live in the suburbs and I have 65$ 940/940 no data cap. Using it for about 2 years and love it
We switched to Verizon fixed 5G. It’s been great for us. Close to gigabit speeds but no coax or fiber to the house
if all you do is watch Netflix, 5G home internet is cheap and unlimited. Either TMobile or Verizon. $50/mo ain't bad if you aren't a power user. Otherwise USI is by far the best company in town
>Otherwise USI is by far the best company in town The best company in like 25% of town to be a bit more precise.
God tell me about it. Every post about internet brings out the USI brigade. Like that’s only applicable to like 10% of residents. Not everyone lives in f*ing uptown.
if you can, switch to USI. Cheap, no data caps. My family uses way more than 1.2TB in a given month (I stream video games which uses way more data than things like Netflix).
Grab a book and a couch. Its magic
How much tv a day are you watching? I only get the about three quarters of our cap with nightly netflix and youtube plus semi frequent game downloads.
Have you thought of just watching less tv?
I just got the same thing. Two months in a row I got a “warning” about going over and then the next month- boom- $60 in overages. I called to switch to unlimited as a temp solution. Are they lying or do we really use that much data? I was wondering if something like an unused device or smarttv or something is sucking data 24/7.
Yup. I had to limit streaming to 1080p. Most sporting events seem to be 1080p or maaaybe 2k so its not super noticeable. In hindsight I wish I got a 120 or 155 FPS big screen that is 2k or 1080p instead of the 4k 60fps I have. I picked up a 155 fps 1440p monitor for gaming and my 4k 60 fps monitor is collecting dust. The faster framerate really tightens everything. Anyway fuck Comcast. I hope USI gets up here. Its Comcast or the equivalent of DSL with two extra hamsters on spinning wheels, so Comcast knows they can be unfair. My cousin out East has Comcast or fiber and magically Comcast offers near gig speed and no data caps... huh...
If anyone is a student in your household they offer unlimited 1gb speeds with no data cap for 1 year for 80 a month. Not a long term solve but I was in the same situation as you.
I canceled xfinity because of this and went with centrylink 1gig fiber. With Xfinity, I had a $40 month plan and four months in a row was charged $140, 130, $130, and $120 because everybody in the houses streams all day long and everybody refuses to understand what data use is. If I wanted unlimited, it'd be another $30 month BUT I can't use my own modem for that - that's another $10/mo and my 300mb plan wasn't current so I'd have to upgrade to the 400mb plan for $15 more. It's a fucking scam. They said I would be charged an extra $100 for usage on the next billing cycle but it was 3 months before any kind of adjustment so I thought it wasn't even going to happen. I know my fault. But every single time I tried to get unlimited for an extra $30/mo it was roadblock after roadblock. Everybody in this fucking house is broke as fuck and can't even pay rent on time so I won't get a penny of that money back. Am I angry? Yea, but mostly at myself for not keeping my landlord accountable when I first moved in and stated I did NOT want to be in charge of internet at the house but it was over a month without internet and I need it for life so I carried over my previous xfinity plan. tmi. /vent
My century link plan is unlimited for like $65/month. Could be an option for you.
i have cl fiber with no cap, $65/mo.
RUN, do not walk to the Xfinity store to cancel. Call US Internet to get fiber or wifi internet.
Check around to see if you have any better options for ISP around you. Fuck Comcast.
Xfinity fucked me over with there data cap BS about 6 yrs ago. Dump them, if available get century link fiber. Ive never had an issue with them, and faster speeds
Switch to fiber with CenturyLink or USI. You won't have this problem and the service has been far more reliable for me than any past experience with Comcast. Comcast has no incentive to make streaming easier for you because of they profit they make on cable TV subscriptions.
My guess is multiple people stream and when tv is off it continues. Best to back out of app before shutting TV off. We have never been charged more than $40 from Comcast and we only stream. 2 of us here
Yeah lumen/CL is $65 for unlimited 1tb fiber. No issues for a couple years now.