you’re talking about a bandwidth cap, not a data cap. data caps are when you get throttled after downloading a certain amount of data or get charged extra. think phone data plans where you have 10 or 20gb or whatever per month
Comment on Researchers unlock fiber optic connection 1.2 million times faster than broadband
RonSijm@programming.dev 6 months agoThe should be, that’s just how fiber works. If they lay a 10 Gb line in the street, they’ll probably sell a 1 Gb connection to a 100 households. (Margins depend per provider and location)
If they give you an uncapped connection to the entire wire, you’ll DoS the rest of the neighborhood
That’s why people are complaining “I bought 1Gb internet, but I’m only getting 100Mb!” - They oversold bandwidth in a busy area. 1Gb would probably be the max speed if everyone else was idle. If they gave everyone uncapped connections the problem would get even worse
crystenn@lemmy.ml 6 months ago
ArchAengelus@lemmy.dbzer0.com 6 months ago
You’re taking about data rates here, measured in bits per second.
Data caps have to do with the total amount of data you are allocated over a longer period of time. Usually per month. In the case of Comcast, it’s 1.5 TB/month.
If the customer exceeds that allotment during the month, they will be charged an additional “overage fee” per arbitrary unit, usually by the gigabyte.
It has nothing to do with the speed they advertise on a line, but rather a way to charge “heavy users” more.
ArtVandelay@lemmy.world 6 months ago
Maybe, just maybe… Don’t oversell your capacity.