T-mobile will let you stream video for free

[rcarteraz]

Does this apply to prepaid customers? Or is it only for postpaid like everything else

 

Good question. I haven't seen anything definitive. It may be like with the music streaming how initially it didn't apply to data but later they were included.

 

 

http://www.theverge.com/2015/11/11/9713874/t-mobile-unlimited-data-plan-huge-price-hike

 

aaand they increased data plan prices

 

Wow.. That basically turns it into a backdoor fee for the service in my eyes. I'd rather forgo and keep current prices. Luckily it doesn't apply to current customers but that's such a shame for new customers. It really goes against their entire "un-carrier" mantra because that's exactly what a carrier would do.

[Mew]

Since only 480p steaming is free, they should only count the difference between 480p and whatever high quality you stream at towards your data count.

[iCrushDreams]

Since only 480p steaming is free, they should only count the difference between 480p and whatever high quality you stream at towards your data count.

Don't think it'd even make that big of a difference. The compression tech they're deploying on both the service end and on their network is designed for 480p and if it's higher than that, it wouldn't be as effective.

[michaelocarroll007]

I beg to differ, one time when my internet was out I went to a mall, used the free wifi to watch a video and as I did I used the screen capture feature of my Z2 to record the video so I could rewatch it at home.  (The video was a recipe for chinese food that I was trying to make)

 

I think all the phones in the Z series of sony can capture video from the screen.

you can download a app on all androids to capture screen but that is nice sony has it built in.

 

Also i do agree its sort of like downloading it i mean technically with a stream your just downloading short bits of it at a time watching it then deleting after watching. i think theres programs on PC that also save streams data without screen recording as you are downloading it and it saves every part instead of deleting it and then saves it as a file   

[LAwLz]

Don't think it'd even make that big of a difference. The compression tech they're deploying on both the service end and on their network is designed for 480p and if it's higher than that, it wouldn't be as effective.

That sounds like grade A marketing bullshit. What's your source?

[iCrushDreams]

That sounds like grade A marketing bullshit. What's your source?

A fact is that 480p is several times smaller files than 1080p. (A bit more than 4 times smaller). T-Mobile is relying on content networks to implement their compression so 480p can be even smaller, and that's front and center on their own website.

If they can shave, say, 30% off of a 480p video bitrate (example, no idea what it actually is), that is less than 8% bandwidth saving at 1080p. So my point was that why would they give you back 8% of your data used on streaming? The percentage of bandwidth they save on 480p is much more than 1080p because of the magnitude of smaller files used for 480p streaming. The savings would be too insignificant.

[QueenDemetria]

That sounds like grade A marketing bullshit. What's your source?

They mention Binge On "optimizing" video streaming( and not optimized when  disabled) 

https://support.t-mobile.com/docs/DOC-24292

http://www.t-mobile.com/offer/binge-on-streaming-video.html?icid=WMM_TM_Q415BNGONU_3HE1YHGRUXZ3352

(for the last link its in the FAQ at the bottom of the page)

[bobhays]

This ^, that's why all those 3rd party youtube download sites were created, if streaming equaled download then you wouldn't need those.

 

 

Stream does not equal download. 

 

 

Unfortunately.

Streaming IS downloading, with the addition of autodelete and conversion. So it's not equal to downloading, but it IS downloading. The reason you need the 3rd party sites is to avoid the autodelete/conversion taking place behind the scenes.

[LAwLz]

A fact is that 480p is several times smaller files than 1080p. (A bit more than 4 times smaller).

If 480p is smaller or not depends on a lot of factors, but yes it will generally be able to be smaller. That part about it being 4 times smaller is just a false blanket statement though. You might think it will be 4 times smaller because it's about 4 times less pixels, but that's not how video codecs work. They don't save things based on a pixel-by-pixel basis. Not even modern image formats does that.

 

T-Mobile is relying on content networks to implement their compression so 480p can be even smaller, and that's front and center on their own website.

So they will use a lower quality version of the original 480p file? This thing sounds worse every time I hear about it.

 

If they can shave, say, 30% off of a 480p video bitrate (example, no idea what it actually is), that is less than 8% bandwidth saving at 1080p. So my point was that why would they give you back 8% of your data used on streaming? The percentage of bandwidth they save on 480p is much more than 1080p because of the magnitude of smaller files used for 480p streaming. The savings would be too insignificant.

And here is the part I wanted a source for. What makes you believe that it is more efficient at 480p compared to let's say 1080p? When you say something is efficient you can't just look at the file size. You also have to factor in the image quality. I could easily make a 1080p video that's smaller than a 480p one. It probably won't have the same size/quality ratio though.

You claimed that the compression they use was designed for 480p and if the resolution was higher it would not be as effective. I call bullshit on that.

 

My guess is that how effective it is was not the key component when deciding on video quality. The key factor was probably file size. 480p was as high as they wanted to go because that's how they could reliability get decent looking video without going above their estimated bandwidth usage. Using other settings and making the videos 720p might actually have been more efficient. The files might have looked 50% better for a 30% bigger file size. But that extra 30% would have pushed them above the pain threshold on their network so they decided against it.

That's what I think.

 

 

 

 

 

They mention Binge On "optimizing" video streaming( and not optimized when  disabled) 

https://support.t-mobile.com/docs/DOC-24292

http://www.t-mobile.com/offer/binge-on-streaming-video.html?icid=WMM_TM_Q415BNGONU_3HE1YHGRUXZ3352

(for the last link its in the FAQ at the bottom of the page)

Yeah, optimized for longevity (of the data plan).

In non-marketing terms that means: The video will be lower quality than normal 480p because we are transcoding it to a lower bit rate.

 

They are also saying the video is "optimized for viewing on your smartphone or tablet" which is just bullshit. I really doubt streaming 480p video at a low bit rate is "optimized" for my 10" 2560x1600 tablet. Pretty sure that as far as video quality goes, streaming the "original" 1920x1080 video from Vessel or whatever would be more "optimized". They are just using the world "optimized" as a synonym to mean "reduced quality". Reducing quality and optimize are not the same thing. Hell I'd say this is false marketing.

[unperfect paul]

I know that this sounds awesome and trust me as a data hog 19gb average a month. My bill would like it if my carrier did this but I wouldn't. This is exactly what I'm afraid of. These are fast lanes but because theses specific apps don't use data you are more likely to use these then other streaming services and to me that's not right. It should be all or none deal

[iCrushDreams]

I know that this sounds awesome and trust me as a data hog 19gb average a month. My bill would like it if my carrier did this but I wouldn't. This is exactly what I'm afraid of. These are fast lanes but because theses specific apps don't use data you are more likely to use these then other streaming services and to me that's not right. It should be all or none deal

You can't do all, as they said it takes an effort on the CDN too. I'm not even sure if they can distinguish it, even if they wanted to. How would you recognize what data is for what?

[gligoran]

Isn't this called zero-rating and against what net neutrality all about?

[iCrushDreams]

Isn't this called zero-rating and against what net neutrality all about?

Well the FCC is on their side so...

[Inkz]

*Free

[QueenDemetria]

Isn't this called zero-rating and against what net neutrality all about?

Yes, and in my review coming up soon I trash T-Mobile about it, since they degrade the quality of all* video services.

 

*Except for a select few.