How Fast Does Anyone Use Up 5 Gb?, Air Cards/Cellular Modems Options

[DXSMac]

I've had an air card (or more correctly, cellular modem) for a year now. Generally, you are limited to 5 Gig a month for a flat rate. So, the question is...... how fast do you use up 5 Gig?

Here is my experience.

If all you do is surf the net and read email, every day, and nothing else, you won't exceed even ONE gig. Or, you may get to barely over 1 Gig.

The "hogs" are downloading movies, and streaming music.

When I camp hosted last year, I was at a place with no TV reception. I HAD to watch "24." So, I downloaded it. A "one hour" episode downloaded will use up 400 meg.

Recently, I started streaming music on Pandora (there is another one called Rhapsody). I discovered that one hour of streaming music, every day, uses up 100 meg EACH DAY.

So far, the most I have used up is 2 GIG in a month (when I streamed music), but I generally average 900 meg a month, usually never exceed 1 GIG.

I know most of the RV parks have WiFi. If you can live with that, fine, and then there is the occasional one or two days where you boondock and live without it, or stay somewhere cheap and live without it.

But if you want to get a cellular modem, that's my experience, yours may be different.

JJ

[John Blue]

JJ,

Great information to have. No one we have talked to had this information.

[pianotuna]

Hi JJ,

That's good information to have. Be aware that there is some "overhead" that doesn't show up--until the bill arrives.

My usual usage with no extraordinary downloads averages 7.5 gigs per month.

Fortunately, in Canada, I have an unlimited Cellular Modem account.

Unfortunately that turns into $3.00 per meg as soon as I cross the USA border

[DXSMac]

My Verizon modem has a way to "check" every day how much has been used up so far. I just remember what it was the previous day and when I check the next morning, it's like, "ok, I used up 100 meg doing THAT thing......."

JJ

[Denali]

On the forums devoted to this subject, the most common usage reported is 1-2 GB per month.

I didn't realize that a one-hour TV show consumed 400 MB. No wonder some folks are hobbled by the 5 GB monthly limit that the carriers impose!

[dalsgal]

We don't download a lot but we both leave our computers online pretty much all the time. Hubby writes websites and does web hosting. I sit in the office of our CG (we are managers) and it is boring so I take my laptop with me and play on it all the time. We use between 5-6 gigs a month even with all that online time.

[RLM]

I'm in the 30 day trial period for my cell system. It's a Mi-Fi card. I'm online several hours a day, but don't download many large files and am not even close to the 5GB.

But if my math isn't fuzzy, then I calculate one could only do about 12-13 hour long tv shows at 400mb each and half that for a movie.

[Lonesoldier]

For the technicly handicapped, of the older generation, explain meg, gig, mi-fi.
PLEASE

[pianotuna]

Hi Lonesoldier,

1 megabyte = 1000 kilobytes
1 gigabyte = 1000 megabytes

a mifi is a wireless router that allows a connection to the internet using cell phone frequencies and allows a laptop or other device to connect to it.

I use about 7.5 gigabytes in a typical month.

I hope this helps.

For the technicly handicapped, of the older generation, explain meg, gig, mi-fi.
PLEASE

[FosterImposters]

Thanks for asking Lonesoldier.
As a US schooled boomer, educated in the era of Fortran, I am very glad there are pianotuna's out there who can keep me on the right path: kilo to mega to giga.

Is there a next level: 1000 gigabytes = ?

[HappiestCamper]

Thanks for asking Lonesoldier.
As a US schooled boomer, educated in the era of Fortran, I am very glad there are pianotuna's out there who can keep me on the right path: kilo to mega to giga.

Is there a next level: 1000 gigabytes = ?

terabyte

[Trentheim]

1000 bytes = 1 kilobyte
1000 kilobytes = 1 Megabyte
1000 Megabytges = 1 Gigabyte
1000 Gigabytes = 1 Terabyte
1000 Terabytes = 1 Petabyte
1000 Petabytes = 1 Exabyte
1000 Exabytes = 1 Zettabyte
1000 Zettabytes = 1 Yottabyte

My digital camera takes a 10 million pixel (megapixel) picture which requires an average of 2.04 Mb of storage space. This means that on a a 5 Gb download limit would cut you off after you downloaded 2451 pictures of exactly this size.

However, nothing on the Web is linear or consistent. Sometimes an image is much smaller, sometimes much larger. Text actually takes up memory (although not much), and things like Flash, Quicktime, etc... can become memory hogs, especially if they're programmed poorly, which will eat into your download limits.

But watching television programs and/or movies will quickly use up a 5 Gb limit.

Just adding a little more geekery to the thread!

JT3

[John Blue]

Lets tune it up a bit.

1 Megabyte is 1024 KB's
1 Gigabyte is 1,048,576 KB's
1 Terabyte is 1,073,741,824 KB's
1 Petabyte is 1,099,511,627,776 KB's

What is next a Commodore 64?

[Lindsay Richards]

Hey John, those Commodore 64's were pretty neat.

[Lonesoldier]

Thanks for the terminology. Probab;y will never understand all of it.