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I have gigabit internet with static IP, web hosting, email hosting, etc from Spectrum Business (even though it's for my home). $330 a month.
 
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I too struggle with this. I mean 10 Gbps is technically fascinating and all, but what is a realistic use case for such speed in a typical household? A 4K movie file would download in under a minute, but so what? Is a 10-minute download time really a killer? I can imagine commercial users (e.g., video production houses slinging around massive files between locations) benefiting from this, but households--not so much. Happy to hear perspectives from others if I'm missing something.

As more things gets connected to the internet, I will have to say, YES WE DO. Who knows what else will constantly use the internet from TVs to fridges to phones to medical equipment. As files get bigger and more appliances use it, bring the fastest you can. Think of it like this if 3 family members watching 4K series each on his own, you need lots of bandwidth.
 
I too struggle with this. I mean 10 Gbps is technically fascinating and all, but what is a realistic use case for such speed in a typical household? A 4K movie file would download in under a minute, but so what? Is a 10-minute download time really a killer? I can imagine commercial users (e.g., video production houses slinging around massive files between locations) benefiting from this, but households--not so much. Happy to hear perspectives from others if I'm missing something.
I have 5Gbps fiber connection from AT&T at my home. At this point, the limitation is more from source/CDN not being able to "feed" fast enough to saturate my 5Gbps connection. As more cloud/server stuff is upgraded, we will indeed see faster downloads, but most CDNs struggle to saturate even 1Gbps.

5Gbps Speedtest.jpeg
 
Think of it like this if 3 family members watching 4K series each on his own, you need lots of bandwidth.
Maybe if you are talking to an ISP sales person when they are trying to upsell you on Gigabit service, but otherwise, multiple 4K streams so not come close to 1Gbps, and would be a drop in the bucket for 10Gbps.

How bout you think of it this way, this is how many simultaneous Netflix streams you can get from 1Gbps service:
Over 600 480p streams
Over 250 1080p streams
Over 50 4K HDR streams

This is what it would be for 10Gbps:
Over 6000 simultaneous 480p streams
Over 2500 simultaneous 1080p streams
Over 500 simultaneous 4K HDR streams

Do you know anyone that streams 500 different devices at the same time?


I know "lots" is a relative and subjective term, but when replying to a post about the lack of use cases for 10Gbps service in a residential setting, I can only assume you are saying that 10Gbps can be useful in the near future.

As more things gets connected to the internet, I will have to say, YES WE DO. Who knows what else will constantly use the internet from TVs to fridges to phones to medical equipment. As files get bigger and more appliances use it, bring the fastest you can.
I have no doubt that more bandwidth will be utilized in the future, but I think that too often techies overestimate how much we will use and how soon in the future those higher speeds will be needed.

Over the past 10 years, ISPs in my area have been pushing 1Gbit service, with a bunch of lies to sell it.

They ask questions like, "do you have multiple people in your home that stream movies at the same time?", or "how many devices to you have connected to the internet at the same time?", as if either one of them have much to do with 1Gbps service.

One of my favorite questions was always "does anyone in your home play video games online?", as if this alone means that you need 1Gbit service.

Interesing note: You can actually play WoW using a dial up connection in 2022. The latency is horrible, but it is still playable.

I know people that were paying for Gigabit service that used it for only 1080p Netflix streams and to get on apps like Facebook.

IMO, 1Gbps service is overkill for most families, and probably will still be for a long time to come.

Think of it like this if 3 family members watching 4K series each on his own
If it is Netflix, you can get this done with about 50Mbps service. The high end of Netflix 4K HDR streams maxes out at 17.5 Mbps, but most 4K HDR is variable bitrate and much lower than that.

Now, if you are talking about some other services, such as ATV+, you will need more bandthwidth, but not anywhere close to 1Gbps or 10Gbps.
 
I have 5Gbps fiber connection from AT&T at my home. At this point, the limitation is more from source/CDN not being able to "feed" fast enough to saturate my 5Gbps connection. As more cloud/server stuff is upgraded, we will indeed see faster downloads, but most CDNs struggle to saturate even 1Gbps.

View attachment 2010995

Would be nice, but I live in Buffalo. So of course, we don't have it. Verizon never even bothered to roll out FIOS to the area.
 
Maybe if you are talking to an ISP sales person when they are trying to upsell you on Gigabit service, but otherwise, multiple 4K streams so not come close to 1Gbps, and would be a drop in the bucket for 10Gbps.

How bout you think of it this way, this is how many simultaneous Netflix streams you can get from 1Gbps service:
Over 600 480p streams
Over 250 1080p streams
Over 50 4K HDR streams

This is what it would be for 10Gbps:
Over 6000 simultaneous 480p streams
Over 2500 simultaneous 1080p streams
Over 500 simultaneous 4K HDR streams

Do you know anyone that streams 500 different devices at the same time?


I know "lots" is a relative and subjective term, but when replying to a post about the lack of use cases for 10Gbps service in a residential setting, I can only assume you are saying that 10Gbps can be useful in the near future.


I have no doubt that more bandwidth will be utilized in the future, but I think that too often techies overestimate how much we will use and how soon in the future those higher speeds will be needed.

Over the past 10 years, ISPs in my area have been pushing 1Gbit service, with a bunch of lies to sell it.

They ask questions like, "do you have multiple people in your home that stream movies at the same time?", or "how many devices to you have connected to the internet at the same time?", as if either one of them have much to do with 1Gbps service.

One of my favorite questions was always "does anyone in your home play video games online?", as if this alone means that you need 1Gbit service.

Interesing note: You can actually play WoW using a dial up connection in 2022. The latency is horrible, but it is still playable.

I know people that were paying for Gigabit service that used it for only 1080p Netflix streams and to get on apps like Facebook.

IMO, 1Gbps service is overkill for most families, and probably will still be for a long time to come.


If it is Netflix, you can get this done with about 50Mbps service. The high end of Netflix 4K HDR streams maxes out at 17.5 Mbps, but most 4K HDR is variable bitrate and much lower than that.

Now, if you are talking about some other services, such as ATV+, you will need more bandthwidth, but not anywhere close to 1Gbps or 10Gbps.

True on all that, though there are some legitimate uses for it. I work from home and downloading a 5GB ISO from Microsoft MSDN used to be painful. With the gigabit service, an hour now only takes 5 minutes. The same with iTunes HD movies. Any large files are zippy fast, though if I could get 5GB like that dude above gets with fiber, that would be sweet. Probably faster than Microsoft or Apple can feed the files.
 
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True on all that, though there are some legitimate uses for it.
There are definitely use cases for 1Gbps and even 10Gbps service, but the huge majority of people would hardly ever utilize such download speeds.

One common use case for 1Gbps service, specifically with cable ISPs is getting the higher tier service for the upload speeds.

The example you have about Apple and iTunes, Apple has very fast servers that can take advantage of a user's higher bandwidth, but this is not common for most servers.

Even with Apple, yeah, you can download the content, updates, etc. faster, but having a slower speed probably won't have that much of an impact unless you are doing a bunch of downloading from Apple.
 
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There are definitely use cases for 1Gbps and even 10Gbps service, but the huge majority of people would hardly ever utilize such download speeds.

One common use case for 1Gbps service, specifically with cable ISPs is getting the higher tier service for the upload speeds.

The example you have about Apple and iTunes, Apple has very fast servers that can take advantage of a user's higher bandwidth, but this is not common for most servers.

Even with Apple, yeah, you can download the content, updates, etc. faster, but having a slower speed probably won't have that much of an impact unless you are doing a bunch of downloading from Apple.

There is also the issue that unmles you have fiber, you are sharing your connection with other houses. 1GB in reality is only 600-700mb, unless its like 3AM.
 
One common use case for 1Gbps service, specifically with cable ISPs is getting the higher tier service for the upload speeds.
Yeah, but the ratio gets worse the higher you go. For example, from what I’ve seen, most plans up to 100 Mbps download advertise 10 Mbps upload, 250 to 500 Mbps plans are typically 20 Mbps upload, and 900+Mbps plans 30 Mbps.

The example you have about Apple and iTunes, Apple has very fast servers that can take advantage of a user's higher bandwidth, but this is not common for most servers.
An obvious example for me are the Xbox-related servers. Granted, it could be geographical distance, nonetheless, maintaining downloads speeds >50Mbps is extremely rare.

There is also the issue that unmles you have fiber, you are sharing your connection with other houses. 1GB in reality is only 600-700mb, unless its like 3AM.
Very much so.

My suggestion/desire:

250 down/250 up, 500 down/250 up, or 500 down/500 up

500 Mbps down is plenty fast, even for multi-GB files. However, much faster upload speed would be far more noticeable with more and more cloud backup, P2P file sharing (e.g. videos via messaging services/social networks), etc. Additionally, in theory, the limits should prevent/reduce the peak time bottlenecking mentioned above.
 
Yeah, but the ratio gets worse the higher you go. For example, from what I’ve seen, most plans up to 100 Mbps download advertise 10 Mbps upload, 250 to 500 Mbps plans are typically 20 Mbps upload, and 900+Mbps plans 30 Mbps.
Ugh. The common plans here (NZ) are 300/100 and 1000/500. Symmetrical plans up to 8000/8000 are readily available, but they're not cheap.
 
Ugh. The common plans here (NZ) are 300/100 and 1000/500. Symmetrical plans up to 8000/8000 are readily available, but they're not cheap.
The 300/100 would seemingly be a solid choice for most as long as it’s (semi-)affordable. Symmetrical (fiber) offerings do exist but, from my research, I would not describe it as "readily available."


(Includes a list of providers, plans that claim symmetrical bandwidth (US))
 
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The 300/100 would seemingly be a solid choice for most as long as it’s (semi-)affordable. From my research, I do not foresee US ISPs investing in that level/ratio of infrastructure.
There was quite a fight here to get everything started, with the government subsidising the initial 'metro'
rollout. However, the providers eventually realised how profitable it was to provide 'premium' services and they're now expanding the network further and further. Last year I was in a little village (population 357 according to Wikipedia) and was surprised to see a fibre access panel in the ground.
 
No one will need 10 GBPS internet for years.

Depends.

You can have 10 gigabit switches I think, but they aren’t really for home use,

Prices have been dropping from the enterprise level and there are models priced for home use, although somewhat pricey.


And if people say you need it for downloading, downloading what exactly?

For downloading there are a few sites that will hit the gigabit speed now, such as Apple software updates. They would benefit with 10GbE.

but what is a realistic use case for such speed in a typical household?

Intranet transfers.

See Post #60.
 
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I too struggle with this. I mean 10 Gbps is technically fascinating and all, but what is a realistic use case for such speed in a typical household? A 4K movie file would download in under a minute, but so what? Is a 10-minute download time really a killer? I can imagine commercial users (e.g., video production houses slinging around massive files between locations) benefiting from this, but households--not so much. Happy to hear perspectives from others if I'm missing something.

Steam, Streaming, Video cameras of security system if needed, etc. If you have a big family this helps a lot when everyone is on the internet at the same time.
 
There is also the issue that unmles you have fiber, you are sharing your connection with other houses. 1GB in reality is only 600-700mb, unless its like 3AM.
Yeah, but the ratio gets worse the higher you go. For example, from what I’ve seen, most plans up to 100 Mbps download advertise 10 Mbps upload, 250 to 500 Mbps plans are typically 20 Mbps upload, and 900+Mbps plans 30 Mbps.
In the US, Cable ISPs have been taking advantage of the US consumer for years, and years.

My hope is that with 5G Fixed Wireless Access, expanding fiber, and Starlink, Cable ISPs start feeling the competition, and increase the value of their offered services.

My old home, I had access to both Comcast (cable ISP) and FiOS (fiber), and their prices were very competitive over the last 15 years. Both services were good, but FiOS alway had the advantage of higher upload speeds. I switched back and forth between them for years to get the best rate, until FiOS offered a flat rate that never increased, 200Mbps service for $35 a month. I stayed with them, and took advantage of the better upload speed with a Plex media server that my family uses away from home.

My current home that I moved into a year ago, I only have Comcast, and have had a lot more outages and dropouts. Not only that, but to get a decent upload speed, I was forced to get the Gigabit service for $69 a month. It is rated at only 35Mbps, but typically gets a little over 40Mbps upload. Download is great, and I never even come close to using the bandwidth.

Even with the Gigabit service, the upload speed isn't enough for some of the 1080p streams on my Plex server.

Yeah, but the ratio gets worse the higher you go.
Where I live, Comcast offers the following ratios:
Down Mbps/Up Mbps Monthly cost for new customers
50/5 $65
100/5 $84
300/10 $40
600/15 $60
900/20 $70
1200/35 $80
3000/3000 $300 <--- This is Comcast's all Fiber service, and it is expensive.

Comcast sometimes has a 200/5 deal for $29 in my area.

All the tiers above are with no contracts, with the exception of the 3000/3000 service, which is a two year contract.

So, if Comcast is my only (traditional) ISP option, and I need more then 35Mbps upload, I am then my only option is their expensive all fiber plan for $300 a month.

5G FWA isn't available at my home, so my only other option is Starlink. I am thinking about trying Starlink for a while, just to see how it is. Trouble with that is the expensive upfront cost and there is a waiting list. Not only that, but the upload speeds might be worse than the Gigabit plan from Comcast, and I am sure the Latency will increase some.

I really miss FiOS, and wished that it expanded where I live (only 3 miles from my old home), but I doubt that will happen.
 
Your right especially Comcast and Cox Cable with raises prices ever few years. They seem to follow each other.

Plus data caps. Unless you pay $50 more a month extra. :O

I told them I would switch to a fiber provider like Google fiber once they were available. They did not believe me lol.
 
Your right especially Comcast and Cox Cable with raises prices ever few years.

Once you are off their plan Comcast will raise your rates. You just call them and enroll in a new special promotion, usually with a 2 year requirement. They have always given me a good deal, in part due to the fact that I have a 4 play. I'm paying $50 less a month than I did 3 years ago and have several service improvements, up from 1 GbE to 1200 Gbps.
 
As more things gets connected to the internet, I will have to say, YES WE DO. Who knows what else will constantly use the internet from TVs to fridges to phones to medical equipment. As files get bigger and more appliances use it, bring the fastest you can. Think of it like this if 3 family members watching 4K series each on his own, you need lots of bandwidth.
Sorry, the math just doesn't work for me with this scenario. 4K streams run at about 14 GB/hr or so at most, so even if a household was streaming five 4K movies simultaneously, the bandwidth required would be under 200 Mbps...well within current broadband capability. My point was that I just don't see the need for so much broadband capacity for a typical household.

Intranet transfers.

See Post #60.
Right, but I was talking about broadband speed, not internal networks. I completely understand why one would want a 10 Gbps internal network if one routinely moves large files around, say between clients and a NAS or server. I suppose the equivalent broadband need would be if one routinely moves large files to and from the cloud, but I don't think this is a real use case for most households.
 
My hope is that with 5G Fixed Wireless Access, expanding fiber, and Starlink, Cable ISPs start feeling the competition, and increase the value of their offered services.

[…]

5G FWA isn't available at my home, so my only other option is Starlink. I am thinking about trying Starlink for a while, just to see how it is. Trouble with that is the expensive upfront cost and there is a waiting list. Not only that, but the upload speeds might be worse than the Gigabit plan from Comcast, and I am sure the Latency will increase some.
I recently switched to Verizon’s 5G Home service and the experience is not bad — a concept in the correct direction, at least I think.

Verizon said:
Download speeds of 85 - 300 Mbps. Typical upload speeds around 10 Mbps.

Origin location:
- Geographical: Saint Cloud, MN metro
- IP based: Twin Cities metro

Speedtest_VZ5GHome_2022-05-30_1242.pngSpeedtest_VZ5GHome_MSP-HOU_2022-05-30_1215.pngSpeedtest_VZ5GHome_MSP-JAX_2022-05-30_1237.pngSpeedtest_VZ5GHome_MSP-SAC_2022-05-30_1239.png

Previously, I had 100/20 from CenturyLink for $45. The speed was acceptable but there were streaks of multi-hour service outages. I have not had the VZ service long enough to judge on that aspect.
 
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Sorry, the math just doesn't work for me with this scenario. 4K streams run at about 14 GB/hr or so at most, so even if a household was streaming five 4K movies simultaneously, the bandwidth required would be under 200 Mbps...well within current broadband capability. My point was that I just don't see the need for so much broadband capacity for a typical household.


Right, but I was talking about broadband speed, not internal networks. I completely understand why one would want a 10 Gbps internal network if one routinely moves large files around, say between clients and a NAS or server. I suppose the equivalent broadband need would be if one routinely moves large files to and from the cloud, but I don't think this is a real use case for most households.

Steam, Streaming, Video cameras of security system if needed, etc. If you have a big family this helps a lot when everyone is on the internet at the same time.

Using all that at once.
 
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