# Verizon metering can't be right



## rekit (Oct 5, 2015)

There are only have a few internet providers in 77532 at my address and we have Verizon-30 g's maximum for $120/mo. We had Directv, but it not connected to 'net. We would have to turn off the 'net sometimes to keep from going over the 30 G's, even though we mostly surfed the net-just the wife and myself with 2 computers, no working at home, no movies, only 2-3 youtube vids, 2 cell phones on the wifi when at home. So we cut the cord and joined Amazon Prime and bought 4 episodes of "Fear of the Walking Dead". Each time it show as 3.8 to 4.2 G's to watch a 45 minute HD episode. I've been round and round with them for several years over their "metering". Anyone know of a way to verify their metering? I downloaded one and it showed much less usage, but they said that it didn't cover all usage?? I don't recall what meter it was. When I google this problem, pages and pages came up of folks with the same problem. If a gas station rigged their pumps, they would be caught eventually.


----------



## Dan203 (Apr 17, 2000)

If you downloaded to an mobile device then the resolution was likely a lot lower then streaming the episode. I believe that mobile downloads are only 720p whereas streaming is full 1080p. That being said 4GB for a 45 minute episode seems a bit high. That puts it at around 12Mbps. Netflix and Vudu stream 1080p at between 6-9Mbps and they look fine. 

There is no chance you were using the 4K version of the app is there?


----------



## waynomo (Nov 9, 2002)

I use Networx. (Freeware) There is an option to monitor your router instead of just the PC it is installed on.

I also have been a long time DUmeter user, but that's a paid app.


----------



## KillerBeagle (Sep 3, 2015)

Amazon Prime video can be a cord-cutter's worst nightmare (if you have data caps). Unlike Netflix and Hulu, there is no option to control bandwidth usage.

I use Gargoyle router firmware (free for any router that it can run on), which lets me monitor (and even throttle) bandwidth and usage on a per-device basis. It's a great way to monitor and control your usage, and the numbers match up with my ISP's usage statistics.

I tried Amazon last night for the first time, watching a newer Transformers movie in 1080 HD, and was shocked to see 8GB of usage after about 1:45 (with another hour to go). The highest I have seen for Netflix HD is about 3.5GB/hour.

At the same time I was watching the bandwidth in real time and it was consistently over 1MByte/second. I did some research and found that the only way to throttle Amazon video (other than for mobile devices and Fire TV) is to fool Amazon into thinking your bandwidth connection is limited.

For the remaining hour, I added a Gargoyle quota which throttled my Roamio to 4Mb/sec. That forced Amazon to drop to 720p and about 2.5Mb/sec.

A router with Gargoyle firmware installed (I like the TL-WDR3600) can be a valuable tool for those of us with internet usage caps.


----------



## rekit (Oct 5, 2015)

Thanks, I'll try to get one of those meters running. But i hate to hear that it IS using that much data. Really hate to go to SD, might as well sell the 50" tv's and watch stuff on the 'puter. lol Maybe we could go to one of those free gigs at nite providers and try to DL everything at nite, but with streaming I'm not sure if you can record stuff-I do have PlayLater and Playon that are supposed to do that. They probably throttle you at nite if they see you are actually using it...


----------



## KillerBeagle (Sep 3, 2015)

Actually I misspoke - it downshifted from 1080 to 720p, so still HD. It's gotten to where there is so much 1080 content that I think of 720p as "not high definition" so I end up calling it SD by mistake.

We have a 65" TV and (for me at least) dropping to 720 does not diminish the entertainment value significantly. We watch all our Netflix content at 720 and have no data cap worries at that resolution.


----------



## aaronwt (Jan 31, 2002)

Amazon uses a bitrate of around 10Mb/s for their 1080P. Higher than what Vudu uses and much higher than what Netflix uses. 

Although with devices that can decode HEVC this should start changing. SInce Amazon has said they plan to have 1080P HEVC encodes for devices to use.


----------



## jth tv (Nov 15, 2014)

1080P HEVC would be how many Mbps ?


----------



## Dan203 (Apr 17, 2000)

jth tv said:


> 1080P HEVC would be how many Mbps ?


For 24fps movies they could probably get it down to 4-5Mbps.


----------



## tootal2 (Oct 14, 2005)

Charter has no data caps

Sent from my LG-H631 using Tapatalk


----------

