Comcast capping Broadband Internet use?

Hope everyone out there has got a couple hundred bucks lying around over the course of the year. Or at least, if you’re a Comcast Internet customer who enjoys “power-surfing” the web and downloading anything, you’d better be prepared to pay a premium for that service.

Arstechnica first reported last week that Comcast is considering implementing bandwidth caps for their ISP users. Ruh-roh.

If you are both a Comcast subscriber and a user of P2P software like Kazaa, Bearshare, Limewire, Napster, Bittorrent, or even iTunes, you should expect that whether you are downloading music for your new party playlist or just using your home computer to send files back and forth between your office, you might get slammed with new fees and overage charges.

Comcast has remained publicly silent on the topic, but internally there is already discussion of a 250GB monthly cap on usage.

Now, let’s face it – 250GB of data a month is far more than the average subscriber is ever going to use. Most homes have one PC with a broadband connection, and many homes use their computers for little more than “e-mail, word processing and photos”. Or at least, that’s the average use for just about every home PC I’ve ever worked on.

But for families with multiple PC’s, or even houses with shared internet connections between multiple apartments, there is a real threat of running over that theoretical 250GB cap. And at an additional monthly fee of $15 for every 10GB of bandwidth usage, the costs could jump drastically.

So what does this all mean? Basically, if you spend a lot of time downloading music, movies, photos, or any other files, or if you stream music and movies through the web, you might be at risk of exceeding this ceiling and running into mega fees on your next Comcast bill.

So what can you do to stay under the cap? For starters, if you have a wireless connection, make sure it is secured. If your connection is open to the world, anyone within range can connect and leech off of your connection, thereby raising your usage for the month. Also, try using software that will allow for you to download multiple files without limiting your speeds – the longer it takes to download files, the more bandwidth you’ll use.

Again, most users will never even sniff the 250GB cap. The discussion is centered around users who spend hours daily surfing the web, playing games, and downloading the newest single from their favorite bands. Pretty much, the definition of the four guys writing for this page. But if you download or stream movies & music on the web, expect to see that 250GB come at you fast by the end of the month.