Aieee! Stealing all my bandwidth! Make it stop!

[grant hallman]

OK, Win10 came installed on my new laptop last month. I like it, except for one thing - ever since i started using it, it started blowing thru my monthly bandwidth at a totally unsustainable rate. Over the last 2 days it's used over 40% of my monthly 10Gb allocation. If i allowed it to continue, i'd have over $200 extra charges from my ISP this month alone.

What are they thinking? Everyone doesn't - and can't - have unlimited bandwidth! My only access to the internet is via wireless/cellular or satellite service, and both carry heavy penalties for going over-plan.

So far, i've managed to disable the "Windows Update" process - that seems a bit extreme, and i'm still not sure it will solve the problem, or that it won't create new problems down the road. I've also tried to declare my internet connection as "metered", but there's no option to do that with an ethernet link, which is how i connect to my "Rocket Hub". I've temporarily unplugged the ethernet cable and now i'm using wi-fi to get from my laptop to the Hub, which lets me declare a Metered connection - again, don't know if that will stop the bleeding or not. Plus, i want the ethernet connection! Why in Murphy's name isn't there an option to make an Ethernet connection, Metered?!?

I just can't be the first rural customer with this problem! I'm going to have to either try to install Win7 on this laptop, or pay another $75/month or more, forever, for a higher cap - for no benefit i can see, or stop using the internet altogether. Why is Win10 doing this to every customer with a capped monthly plan? To say nothing of what it's doing to the infrastructure of every ISP who thought they could provide "unlimited" service...

Anyone know of a fix? Hopefully a fix that doesn't make things worse somewhere else? Anyone at all?

 

[Tim Locke]

Apart from updates have you turned off those annoying News,Money and Weather apps on the start screen. I don't know how often they poll for new info but it is fairly often I think.
You could turn off Defender and use a AV app but first I would go to settings-update-defender and turn off most of the buttons. Defender updates aren't big but they can happen twice a day sometimes.
Also settings-privacy-feedback and turn off all the telemetry


You will hate this but my W10 PC has amassed 61GB of downloads in the last 30 days of which I suspect only about 1/2 is stuff I have done on purpose.


Check this out as well

https://www.windows10forums.com/threads/how-to-disable-windows-10-spying.6181/

 

[grant hallman]

Apart from updates have you turned off those annoying News,Money and Weather apps on the start screen. I don't know how often they poll for new info but it is fairly often I think.
You could turn off Defender and use a AV app but first I would go to settings-update-defender and turn off most of the buttons. Defender updates aren't big but they can happen twice a day sometimes.
Also settings-privacy-feedback and turn off all the telemetry


You will hate this but my W10 PC has amassed 61GB of downloads in the last 30 days of which I suspect only about 1/2 is stuff I have done on purpose.


Check this out as well

https://www.windows10forums.com/threads/how-to-disable-windows-10-spying.6181/

 

[grant hallman]

Thanks for replying. Yes, i have removed or disabled all the panes on the Start screen. No, i can't switch off Defender - i can get to the screen and see the switches, but they're all set to "On" and greyed out, won't move. Which is another problem. I've also got all the privacy settings i can find, OFF, and adblocker running on Chrome. This just has to stop. When people realize how much this is going to cost them, there's going to be a very large backlash, perhaps even a class action lawsuit. I hope some technical solutions are offered first.

Right now i'm in range of a wifi system that's uncapped, but for the next 2 weeks i'll be home again. Can't wait to see what happens at the end of this billing cycle.

 

[Trouble]

I believe that when using a cellular data or wireless connection you should be able to switch to a "metered" connection and that may provide some relief from some of the excess data usage.
http://windows.microsoft.com/en-US/windows-8/metered-internet-connections-frequently-asked-questions
Unfortunately, I don't believe that a wired Ethernet connection has this option available yet.