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AT&T Throttling

I

itjw

macrumors 65816
Original poster
Dec 20, 2011
1,088
6
So of course I upgrade to the 5S first thing Friday morning, and transfrerred over my unlimited data AT&T plan (never giving it up until they take it away... which is coming soon I'm afraid).

At any rate, I'm already at 7GB or so 50% of the way through my month, and was being throttled on the 5. After changing to the new 5S however, I am no longer being throttled. I have confirmed through the app that I am still on unlimited, and have paperwork from the upgrade indicating so, so this doesn't seem to be an issue of the switcheroo they tried last year either...

Anyone else not throttled after the change? I wonder if it's tied to the SIM or the IMEI? Definitely enjoying it regardless!
 
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Iphone5preorder

macrumors 6502a
Sep 20, 2012
873
466
My 5 stopped being throttled back in February ish. Att has invested billions into the network and they now have a stable enough network to allow unlimited users to use a little more than they allowed before.



Edit: please don't abuse it though or they might bring it back :). Don't be like my friend who uses 40gb+ a month. She's going to ruin it for all of us soon. :)
 
J

jtp098

macrumors 6502a
Apr 19, 2010
733
1
Purchase
itjw said:
So of course I upgrade to the 5S first thing Friday morning, and transfrerred over my unlimited data AT&T plan (never giving it up until they take it away... which is coming soon I'm afraid).

At any rate, I'm already at 7GB or so 50% of the way through my month, and was being throttled on the 5. After changing to the new 5S however, I am no longer being throttled. I have confirmed through the app that I am still on unlimited, and have paperwork from the upgrade indicating so, so this doesn't seem to be an issue of the switcheroo they tried last year either...

Anyone else not throttled after the change? I wonder if it's tied to the SIM or the IMEI? Definitely enjoying it regardless!
Click to expand...

so what do you do with all the data :cool:
 
L

Lucille Carter

Suspended
Jul 3, 2013
1,266
4
I think that AT&T has relaxed it's throttle as several of my friends who usually get throttled have not this month and they did not upgrade their phones.

It could be a city by city thing depending on the available bandwidth.
 
salimdao

salimdao

macrumors member
Sep 27, 2007
96
23
Anaheim, CA
I was at 6GB on my 4S yesterday. I was worried I was going to get throttled, but it never happened. When I upgraded to the 5S last night, it seems that my data count reset. Try calling *DATA#. AT&T will text you your data usage. Mine shows that my data usage reset on the 5S.
 
NYY FaN

NYY FaN

macrumors 6502
Jun 22, 2009
457
17
New York
I'm just curious what kind of stuff you guys use your phones for to use 6GB a month? I typically just stream XM through the app while commuting, twitter/fb/email/web surfing etc and have never passed 2.5 GB in a month and I am typically around 1GB.
 
D

drew.bowser

macrumors regular
Sep 23, 2008
120
17
Missouri
AT&T still throttles. I get it every month at my 5gb limit. No I do not jailbreak or tether - I just use my phone a lot. ) It seems though that they are not slowing it down as much.
 
Aylan

Aylan

macrumors regular
Jun 3, 2013
165
1
Boston
TSX said:
I haven't been throttled since LTE came to my area.
Click to expand...

This.

I got throttled a few times when I was on their "4G" service. Once I got my 5 and went LTE, I have yet to be throttled. I have only gone over the 5GB limit 3 times though, and all those times it was juts 6.5-7GB. They may have some other ceiling that they are not telling us about.
 
I

Iphone5preorder

macrumors 6502a
Sep 20, 2012
873
466
NYY FaN said:
I'm just curious what kind of stuff you guys use your phones for to use 6GB a month? I typically just stream XM through the app while commuting, twitter/fb/email/web surfing etc and have never passed 2.5 GB in a month and I am typically around 1GB.
Click to expand...

Easy. I listen to music through YouTube a lot. When I run, work, etc. This steams video so the Gb adds up quickly. But I try to keep it below 10 because I don't wanna piss off AT&T or abuse the system rather. I know I have "unlimited" but I'm also understanding..
 
U

user-name-here

macrumors 65816
Aug 31, 2013
1,111
1
I don't think I've EVER gone over 1.5 GB in a month. Although I personally don't stream Pandora, Youtube, Netflix all the time either.
 
S

sfgr415

macrumors newbie
Jun 3, 2011
8
0
I was throttled on my first month after getting an iphone 5. After the throttle, I tried to watch my data usage. I haven't been throttled in a long time and recently checked my data usage. I was averaging 10-15gb a month of data. It seemed as if ATT stopped throttling, and then I got throttled this last month.
 
Carlanga

Carlanga

macrumors 604
Nov 5, 2009
7,132
1,409
NYY FaN said:
I'm just curious what kind of stuff you guys use your phones for to use 6GB a month? I typically just stream XM through the app while commuting, twitter/fb/email/web surfing etc and have never passed 2.5 GB in a month and I am typically around 1GB.
Click to expand...

Streaming can take a good chunk, skype and app updates , Dropbox files syncing etc.
----
My data was reset yesterday w the new phone and it shows 534mb consumed. Must have been mostly the 2hrs I was skyping. :eek:

----------
burritolove said:
why don't you people using tons of data at home use wifi?
Click to expand...

I tend to not use my wifi for my cel at home and clog my network w more devices.
Speeds at home l:
Home wifi 4mb
Cel LTE yesterday 34mb
I do use most of my data outside my house. The most data I have used is 9 one time. Most of the times I consume 4-5gb of cel data


-----

TS the limit for LTE before a possible throttle is 5 while 3G4G is only 3. So is looser w high speed users
 
I

itjw

macrumors 65816
Original poster
Dec 20, 2011
1,088
6
Update: back to throttled.

It was nice while it lasted. Still usable at .5Mb down, netflix still streams fine, and I get better signal with the 5s.

All good, but 5GB is all I get.
 
Applejuiced

Applejuiced

macrumors Westmere
Apr 16, 2008
40,672
6,533
At the iPhone hacks section.
I went over on with a few lines on my family plan for 2-3 months straight and no throttling yet.
Not by a lot. Ended up hitting around 6-7GB's by months end.
It does varies by location and network traffic. Many times they let you go further than the stated 5GB on some locations.


itjw said:
Update: back to throttled.

It was nice while it lasted. Still usable at .5Mb down, netflix still streams fine, and I get better signal with the 5s.

All good, but 5GB is all I get.
Click to expand...

So how much data you ended up racking up till they throttled you?
 
Nautilus007

Nautilus007

macrumors 68030
Jul 13, 2007
2,642
1,320
U.S
Allport1954 said:
Hmm, this will be interesting to monitor. Before, with my 4s, I was being throttled at 3GB per month.
Click to expand...

I consistently use 5-10 gb's per month on unlimited and have only been warned to get throttled once about a year ago. They have never actually done it knock on wood.
 
I

itjw

macrumors 65816
Original poster
Dec 20, 2011
1,088
6
Applejuiced said:
I went over on with a few lines on my family plan for 2-3 months straight and no throttling yet.
Not by a lot. Ended up hitting around 6-7GB's by months end.
It does varies by location and network traffic. Many times they let you go further than the stated 5GB on some locations.




So how much data you ended up racking up till they throttled you?
Click to expand...

I made it to almost 9GB before it got "fixed"... HOWEVER:

The "trick" of doing a full reboot of the phone, disabling LTE, enabling Airplane mode, calling yourself, waiting for the popup to disengage Airplane mode, doing so, and then re-enabling LTE seems to have accomplished the same thing that happened when I switched phones mid month (they aren't throttling me now).

I think there must be some sort of reset at the tower level that happens when this occurs. There must be an explanation, as I was being throttled, and now I'm not, all during the same billing cycle.

So far only the "trick" and changing phones has worked. There has to be something in common their causing the glitch. I'll take it for now, and hope they won't fix it for a while:)
 
jav6454

jav6454

macrumors Core
Nov 14, 2007
22,303
6,257
1 Geostationary Tower Plaza
Allport1954 said:
Hmm, this will be interesting to monitor. Before, with my 4s, I was being throttled at 3GB per month.
Click to expand...

There is a difference between network usage using 3G technologies and LTE technologies.

LTE is much cheaper to pump data through and at the same time much more data can be pumped through at lower resource usage (back to the money issue).
 
M

megapopular

macrumors 6502a
Aug 21, 2007
737
10
drew.bowser said:
AT&T still throttles. I get it every month at my 5gb limit. No I do not jailbreak or tether - I just use my phone a lot. ) It seems though that they are not slowing it down as much.
Click to expand...

Just curious, when you are throttled what kind of "slower" speeds are you getting? Thanks!
 
I

itjw

macrumors 65816
Original poster
Dec 20, 2011
1,088
6
megapopular said:
Just curious, when you are throttled what kind of "slower" speeds are you getting? Thanks!
Click to expand...

.5Mb

It's usable actually (even for Hulu/Netflix), and since it's unlimited I'm not "complaining" per se, but the LTE trick (still working, by the way) is a welcome change from throttle land.

I wish it was getting better, but lately it's been at 5.00001GB each and every month. I thought they were expanding their networks and decreasing the number of people on unlimited, but I have had been throttled consistently since getting the 5 on launch day 2012. Never had an issue with 3G prior, but LTE really makes data consumption easy and worthwhile...
 
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