Broadband time

Oh gosh, I don't know, but I do that all the time, on this and other sites

Please, does anyone know?

I would think if your computer shows you are connected then you are online but I think you actually have to be viewing a site to be using your allowance, although I could be wrong and hope someone with more technical knowhow can help

.........Techies, where are you?

Just googled and got this....

ask-leo.com/does_leaving_tabs_open_in_my_browser_eat_up_bandwidth.html

So, basically, no.

Playing games, downloading pictures, leaving facebook going all eat up the width.

Oh. I can play Minecraft offline, ok. Thanks.
I don't do facebook............sometimes copy photos, does that count?

I can't make out why I haven't had this warning before!

Alie, I get the warning nearly every month telling me I'm close to my broadband usage - usually about two or three days before the next month starts!

I think they just send them out hoping you'll be worried enough to go for a bigger package - just ignore it, even if you go over it's only around £5.00 extra to pay for that month.

BT always sent me emails saying I was getting close to my limit when I was only three quarters of the way through. I only had to pay the £5 a couple of times though Scare tactics to upgrade? (I'm now with Sky - unlimited)

I'm permanently signed into Facebook. I turn my router and my computer right off when we go away and when when I switch back on I'm still signed in so no it can't use up your usage.

It's when you have the automatic playing of little videos on facebook. Tablets are bad for that.

No, just being logged in won't do it! But if you had a page showing permanently that played moving ads and what have you, then it would.

Best to disable all the autoplay videos - that's what I did ages ago because they irritate the hell out of me.

Just to agree that being connected to the Internet doesn't use up bandwidth allowance. Leaving a web/forum page open doesn't either unless there is (as mentioned) streaming video or other moving page content present. Uploading, perhaps a photo or video, will use up bandwidth allowance too.

Going a web/forum the page in the first place uses bandwidth because the page content has to be downloaded for displaying on the computer. Data transfer is occurring at that time and for that read 'bandwidth usage'.

Having said that, there is a factor that saves bandwidth usage. Browsers have a cache. When you visit a site, a lot of its page content is downloaded to the computer and stored in the browser's cache. When revisiting that site/forum/webpage, some of the content will drawn from the browser cache and isn't downloaded again. This saves bandwidth usage so won't use up the allowance. This certainly applies to images although (I believe) not videos.

Ah, so this is why it's not always a good idea to empty the cache then?

If the cache gets too full, it can sometimes cause various browser faults. Emptying the cache can be a good thing to try if a browser doesn't work as well as it should.

Barring that, I'd say it is best to just let it build so that the image content of the sites visited regularly will be downloaded and stored there, so saving bandwidth usage. Such content won't be downloaded again unless the cache is emptied.

This doesn't affect those who have unlimited bandwidth usage but it still can be best to keep a cache. When a page of a regularly visited site is opened, images will already be in the cache and that's where the browser will get them from (it looks there first to see if it has them). This is a faster process than having to download them from the Internet again.

I have only just "gone" with BT and have 40 mb. I have been told that will be plenty, I do not use u-tube or movies etc but as a matter of interest does anyone know how much unlimited broadband costs with them? With talk talk it was unlimited as were all calls also 1571 and caller display ,both of which are a small monthly call with BT.