limited usage internet


Aggelakis

 

Posted

Hey guys i used to be a hardcore CoX player before we moved out to the country. Now we live in the middle of now where and the only internet i can get out here is the verizon wireless wifi card. I was wondering if it would be possible to play city of heroes on this verizon wifi card. It has a 5 gb limit per month. Thanks in advance for any feedback


 

Posted

Erg....

If you played rarely and didn't do much else, maybe. I can't see that being a spectacular connection, though. And if you have to reinstall, or - say - we get a good size patch (such as an issue with a new zone,) that's going to eat up a fair bit of your limit.


 

Posted

According to my network monitor, CoH has used from 167 megs to 400 megs each week for the past four weeks and the high point included a patch. That's playing 2-4 hours a day with a bit more on the weekends.


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Posted

Thank you for the info Memphis_Bill. I'll think twice before getting that verizon card. I have one more ? for you. I got to a local community college and they have free wifi. However, you have to got onto their website and hit a button inorder to access their internet. I have done that then opened up city of heroes to try to play. However, it wont let me on, it say not internet connection or servers are down. Is there any way i can get on using their internet? or do they have it set up to where you can't play games on it?


 

Posted

It's likely that it only opens the ports used for Web access, and blocks the ones that games would use. If that's the case, there's no way for you to play the game over that connection, unless you make friends in the school's IT department.


@Roderick

 

Posted

Roderick is correct. They must be blocking certain types of traffic, otherwise I would expect the method you used (connect in browser, start game) to work. I have done this myself in several coffee shops and hotels.




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Posted

If you do want to play, I would suggest going to a coffee shop or somewhere that offers the kind of connecrivity you need to install the game and to upgrade any large patches. (Such as after a major issue release.) Otherwise, as mentioned above, you should be able to play CoH without too much risk of blowing your limit.

Although i would suggest setting up a warning/cutoff limit with your service providsr to make sure. Most will allow you to do that to avoid unexpectedly getting a bill for hundreds of dollars.


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Posted

Silly Q, but would turning down the GFX affect the data usage at all in this case? Since the Op hasn't asked yet and I was curious.


 

Posted

Quote:
Originally Posted by WanderingAries View Post
Silly Q, but would turning down the GFX affect the data usage at all in this case? Since the Op hasn't asked yet and I was curious.
I can't see any reason why it would. The data transfered while playing between the server and your computer doesn't include graphical data. The patches are what gets the graphic data onto your computer. It's just info like where the enemies are at, what moves they're doing, where they're heading to. Take a look at a demo record and that should be basically what's going between server and your computer.


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Posted

Ahh another poor soul that has to suffer with wireless internet.

Fear not. I have had for the past 3 years a USB verizon wireless 3G dongle that is my home's internet connection. I got the USB stick that has an antenna port on it to help get a better signal. I did have the 5GB cap and was able to play about 1-2 hours every day without bumping into the cap. I did bump my connection up to 10gig limit and got a wireless router that my USB stick can plug into so my whole house has internet now. (Xbox, nook, laptops all now work fine on it).

BUT on 3G this game will push the limits of what that network can handle when you are in iTrials (download speed not your cap). I turned off team buffs in the UI to help limit the amount of extra data sent to me and that helped some. 3G on verizon is so overloaded now that you should not expect anymore than 1M down.

On the bright side... Verizon has said they are commited to put 4G eq at every tower they have 3G by the end of 2013 (probably sooner). About 2 months ago my 3G/4G modem switched to 4G and has not gone back. I now get about 8M down and a much better connection.

Also verizon is now selling the home fixed 4G (only) internet service. You need to go to a local verizon store to get details about it/order it. But its a bit cheaper than a mifi or usb dongle. 60 for 10gig a month instead of 80. Also its much better than satalite which you should NEVER think about!

Good luck!


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Posted

Quote:
Originally Posted by WanderingAries View Post
Silly Q, but would turning down the GFX affect the data usage at all in this case? Since the Op hasn't asked yet and I was curious.
As said, no, that won't do anything. However, there is a setting to not send buff numbers, which might drop transfer data significantly in large-gathering settings (ship raids, big leagues, etc).


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Posted

Quote:
Originally Posted by Aggelakis View Post
As said, no, that won't do anything. However, there is a setting to not send buff numbers, which might drop transfer data significantly in large-gathering settings (ship raids, big leagues, etc).
From everything I've heard, turning off Buff info helps greatly on limited bandwidth.


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Posted

I use a Verizon 3G USB dongle as well, with a 5GB cap. In the area I live it's very rare to be able to get a cellphone signal, but with a decent antenna and a small signal booster I usually maintain a usable 3G signal for my computer. Playing City, even for several hours at a time, uses less bandwidth than my usual Google image search. It's not the play time you'll have to watch out for, it's the updates.

There are some typical internet-y things that I usually don't do, like watch Youtube videos or stream other video or music content. I don't normally download a lot of stuff either. So the 5GB cap is something I've been able to work within. One thing to note is that if you play any browser-based games, like RuneScape or Drakensang, they will use much more bandwidth than City.


 

Posted

Quote:
Originally Posted by Roderick View Post
It's likely that it only opens the ports used for Web access, and blocks the ones that games would use. If that's the case, there's no way for you to play the game over that connection, unless you make friends in the school's IT department.
You can also scope out other places around the school. While they are gating their official guest access wifi, I bet it'll be trivially easy to find some rogue nodes. I have one near my office at *NAME OF SCHOOL WITHHELD* that I use.


 

Posted

Quote:
Originally Posted by TWilli View Post
Hey guys i used to be a hardcore CoX player before we moved out to the country. Now we live in the middle of now where and the only internet i can get out here is the verizon wireless wifi card. I was wondering if it would be possible to play city of heroes on this verizon wifi card. It has a 5 gb limit per month. Thanks in advance for any feedback
Even a 3g, supposedly 1Mbps download, connection would be better than what I have.
Sadly, I don't know if it is available, or supported anyway, in my area yet.

I also can't really afford the price and the data cap would be too low.



Honestly, I don't know why they have such a stupidly low cap, other than greed. The cap should be set by the download speed. That caps your usage a lot more effectively than "oops, we let you use too much now we're going to charge you extra and then some".