How long can I listen to The Archers (using mobile 'phone streaming media)?

January 16, 2008 6:11 AM

I've just changed mobile 'phone provider to T-Mobile's Web'n'walk Max, which allows me 'unlimited' web access (up to 3Gb/month which is their 'fair use' limit). So, this means I can now listen to Radio 4 online (at 20.7Kbps live, I'm informed by my PDA) - but how much radio can I listen to before I exceed my limit (bearing in mind I'll be wanting to do a bit of surfing etc. too)?
posted by timpollard to computers & internet (5 comments total)

$ units
2084 units, 71 prefixes, 32 nonlinear units

You have: 3 gigabyte / (20.7 kilobyte/s)
You want: hr
       3 gigabyte / (20.7 kilobyte/s) = 40.257649 hr

Looks like you could listen for 40 hours, if you didn't do anything else. Unfortunately there is no way to know what "a bit of surfing" means. For some people, that alone would already be more than 3 GB/month.
posted by grouse at 6:20 AM on January 16 [1 favorite]

Hi there, i'm afraid I can't help with the maths of kilobytes used per second etc. but I have the exact same 3 gig per month, t-mobile USB webnwalk dongle thingy. From my own practical use, i've always been surprised how little a dent there is in the 3 gigs from playing poker online and browsing. Its only downloading video that really takes up the bandwidth.

There's a useful enough tool that comes with it that you can use to watch your downloading and uploading and it gives you a constantly updating figure for how much you've used in the month so you know exactly where you are. I sometimes watch the uploading versus downloading graph when i'm downloading a bittorrent video to make sure i'm getting a reasonable ratio. This is all in the programme that you use to connect to the internet so it's all easily available.

If all you do is listen to streaming radio and a little surfing, i'm sure your 3 gigs will easily last you. Try it for a couple of days and look to see how much you've used. I love the thing.
posted by galactain at 6:33 AM on January 16

grouse: Doesn't Kbps mean Kilobits per second? And aren't there eight bits in a byte?
posted by Dec One at 6:35 AM on January 16

i'm really sorry, i can't believe i'm one of those people who doesn't read the question properly. i see you have it through your mobile phone. in any case, i really think 3 gigs will last you and i'm sure there'll be a similar tool with it that allows you to know exactly how much you're using. apologies.
posted by galactain at 6:35 AM on January 16

Dec One: Well, he said he was getting 3 Gb of bandwidth a month, so if you assume that means bits too, then it's the same amount. If he gets 3 gigabytes a month, but only uses 20.7 kilobits a second, then he gets 322 hours.
posted by grouse at 6:50 AM on January 16