Saturday, May 5, 2007

May 5th, 2007

We're at 25,000 visitors! Thank You all for your interest in this issue and getting the word out. According to Sitemeter, we have visitors from Australia, Germany, the UK, Brazil, Thailand, Japan and Israel to name just a few countries. I've received links to articles around the world. This is quite the accomplishment after nearly 4 months of operation. With people such as you spreading the word, we may make a positive change yet.


So here we are. The next 30 days with DSL. This month I needed to pull down more iso's than usual. I'm developing some code and needed to pull down RedHat AS3, AS4, and AS5. Binaries and source. That's on top of our normal usage. So here are the screen shots.







Here is the usage chart.









And here are the numbers.




Why do I show these? Because I was very suspicious when the Abuse department stated we were using 250-300 gigs a month. I simply couldn't believe we were hitting those numbers. I only wish I was monitoring it at this level back then. I have spoken with a couple dozen people who have captured their usage. In every case so far, the Abuse department's quoted numbers do not match what terminated customers monitoring software reported. Since Comcast doesn't provide any way of monitoring usage, you simply have to take their word for it. This reflects poorly on the company. With as much money as the company made last year, they can spend a few bucks and figure this problem out.

BTW, If I don't respond to an email or post please don't take it personally. I do have 6 kids and a wife to spend time with. Not to mention my employment and after hour activities keep me busy. I'll do the best I can to respond.


UTOPIA UPDATE

There are also a few other things of interest I've been working on. I'm trying to get together with the City Council's and especially the Mayor's of cities with Utopia. At least a couple of them to discuss how things are going. I'd like to copy what they did in the City of West Jordan. I've heard plenty of scary stories about iProvo. With 14 cities adopting Utopia, I figure somebody had to do it properly. Once I have something to report I'll post it here.

A little over a month ago I had a pleasant chat with Jason Porter and Pete Ashdown, CEO of Xmission.com. That conversation I felt was very helpful. Pete is very excited with Utopia and we walked away with a laundry list of things to do. More on this in upcoming posts.

I really appreciate Jason's help these last few months. In researching why we are not allowed to join Utopia at this time, Jason discovered the following legislation which spells it out. Fortunately part of it goes away after July 2007 (yes, this year). I've been sending letters to the legislature and my representative. I strongly recommend everyone to do the same. Make them aware of what they could be getting themselves into and encourage competition.

Here are a few other links Jason provided. Very insightful.

If you have a story, please feel free to post it here or email me.

Keep up the great job of getting the word out!!

6 comments:

Douglas Muth said...

Just out of curiosity, can you tell me what package you used to generate the graph and the report? I've been wanting to do something like that on my own DSL connection at home.

Thanks,

-- Doug

u235sentinel said...

Douglas Muth said...

Just out of curiosity, can you tell me what package you used to generate the graph and the report? I've been wanting to do something like that on my own DSL connection at home.


This report actually is a screen shot from my ISP stats page. You can however create reports like this using RRDTool or MRTG. RRDTool is recommended as it's nextgen.

You will need snmpd running on the system you walk to pull metrics from. I know how to do it from a Linux / Unix environment. I believe they have RRDTool/MRTG for Windows though I've never done it.

I'm mainly a Linux geek :-)

Looking at their downloads page I see a win32 zip file available for download. Maybe I'll mess with it someday.

Good Luck with it. These are nice tools.

RRDTool is available at http://oss.oetiker.ch/rrdtool

André said...

Just curious, do your ISP stats match the ones you take on your side? I had an ISP that inflated their numbers a lot :)

u235sentinel said...

André said...

Just curious, do your ISP stats match the ones you take on your side? I had an ISP that inflated their numbers a lot :)

May 15, 2007 1:23 AM


Yes, I'm running vnstat and MRTG. The numbers correlate with what I'm seeing.

Unknown said...

I've received their phone call and started monitoring my usage since mid-april. I use DU Meter (Windows). Just wonder if readers can post the highest bandwidth they've used without being discontinued. I've used 86GB (download and upload) in May without problems. Somehow I've used 112GB this month. I'm afriad I will be in trouble soon. Please post your numbers so we can kind of figure out a safe range of bandwidth.

Thanks

u235sentinel said...

changhsu_liu said...

I've received their phone call and started monitoring my usage since mid-april.


I strongly recommend you start moving things over to another service. Email, address book and so on. Comcast has hijacked mine for the next 12 months. They can keep it. It took me a little effort but I was able to reconstruct what I needed. Save yourself the headache and do it as soon as possible.

I use DU Meter (Windows). Just wonder if readers can post the highest bandwidth they've used without being discontinued. I've used 86GB (download and upload) in May without problems. Somehow I've used 112GB this month. I'm afriad I will be in trouble soon. Please post your numbers so we can kind of figure out a safe range of bandwidth.
Thanks


From what I've learned there isn't a safe range. Some CSR's are now saying they heard 200 Gigs is the max. That's simply not true and neither is it a stated company limit. I've spoken with people in Silicon Valley who download nearly a Terabyte a month (yeah, that made my eyes get really big too). Other's who used under 100 Gigs and still got the call. At least these are numbers I'm hearing.

I've been told the number is variable. It depends where you live and whether Comcast has invested in your area. If they think they can get more out of an area they will invest it in. At least that's what I believe from what I'm hearing.

Broadbandreports.com has other's who have stated their usage when they received (creepy drum roll please) "The Call". If I remember correctly, one guy downloaded in the low 60's when he was terminated.

Anyway, support Comcast's competition. Go to your City Council and let them know what's happening across the country to many Comcast customers. Support Fiber to the home and good luck dude.