Windows 10 / limited data background data usage questions?

[narrdarr]

So my grandparents only 10gigs a month of data. Which is fine they don't do anything except email and check a couple forums. Maybe look something up once in a while.

 They might use 2 gigs in a month.

But they have have been having their windows 10 laptop. It blow thru their 10gb in just a couple of hours.

I believe I have everything sorted out for them now. But some of these thing using data in the background I'm not sure about like this. What is it and why?

[Eigenvektor]

Other would be anything that doesn't fit into any of the other categories. Since it says host is "www.reviews.com", I'd assume that is HTTP traffic to that website (since HTTPS has it's own category).

 

Btw. try using Alt+Print or the Windows Snipping tool for screenshots, much better to read that way.

[narrdarr]

can I kill it? If so how to?

Ps 

I know about prntscrn just forgot pw for the forum so used my phone for the quickness

[Eigenvektor]

2 minutes ago, narrdarr said:

can I kill it? If so how to?

Ps 

I know about prntscrn just forgot pw for the forum so used my phone for the quickness

What exactly are you trying to kill? A one time connection to a website that used a bit over 2 kB of data? That's hardly going to make a dent in a 10 GB plan.

 

It's probably more useful to tell Windows you're on a metered connection: https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/help/4028458/windows-metered-connections-in-windows-10

[narrdarr]

A one connection I wouldnt g2s about. But it actually running 24/7 along with a couple of other small things. Its adding up to 5% of the data plan and with  spikes reaching 900 it can be 7 to 8 % of the data plan. Which is alot considering the size of the data plan. So yes every byte counts.

[kirashi]

2 hours ago, narrdarr said:

So my grandparents only 10gigs a month of data. Which is fine they don't do anything except email and check a couple forums. Maybe look something up once in a while.

 They might use 2 gigs in a month.

But they have have been having their windows 10 laptop. It blow thru their 10gb in just a couple of hours.

I believe I have everything sorted out for them now. But some of these thing using data in the background I'm not sure about like this. What is it and why?

Your screenshots show tiny itty bitty amounts of data use - look at prior usage history to find out what used the data. Chances are I would bet that Windows 10 needed to download an update or something, or they visited a streaming website or advertisement laden website with autoplaying video ads.

[narrdarr]

43 minutes ago, kirashi said:

Your screenshots show tiny itty bitty amounts of data use - look at prior usage history to find out what used the data. Chances are I would bet that Windows 10 needed to download an update or something, or they visited a streaming website or advertisement laden website with autoplaying video ads.

As stated I already took care of the big file. It's these small file that that never stop that are using 5 to 10 % of the data plan that I'm trying to fix

[Eigenvektor]

5 hours ago, narrdarr said:

As stated I already took care of the big file. It's these small file that that never stop that are using 5 to 10 % of the data plan that I'm trying to fix

I don't think there's much left to "fix" here. As I said you can configure Windows to tell it that you're on a limited plan. At the very least, this will prevent Windows from downloading updates when you're approaching the limit. This setting is also visible to other software, which means apps that are programmed to take this into account will also limit their traffic or even stop when you approach it.

 

Something else you can do to lower data usage: Install an ad blocker like uBlock Origin and/or use Pi-hole. My Pi-hole tells me it has prevented 20% of requests from going out, so you could say it has roughly reduced internet traffic by 20%.

 

Let's go over the items in your screenshot:

——————————

Hypertext Transfer Protocol over SSL/TLS (HTTPS)

This is normal internet traffic from your browser. Based on the icon, you can see that this was mainly from Firefox. Meaning it happens when you browse the internet. Nothing you can do here other than not using the internet. It could also be Firefox checking for updates. I would not recommend to disable auto-updates since that means you miss out on bug fixes and security fixes.

Other

The screenshot of the small Window you opened shows "NT Kernel & System" meaning this is most likely traffic from the OS itself. Not much you can do to prevent this, other than shut down your computer.

Multicast DNS (mDNS)

This is used to resolve host names on the local network (e.g. that of your printer). Meaning this traffic should not go out to the internet in any case, so it doesn't use up your bandwidth.

Domain Name System (DNS)

An essential service used to resolve host names like "linustechtips.com" to an IP address. Without this you can't use your browser and other apps that connect to the internet. It's usage will increase every time you visit a website. Nothing to do here⁽¹⁾.

Simple Network Management Protocol (SNMP)

This is used to monitor other devices on the local network (e.g. see the icon: your printer). This is local network traffic again. It doesn't go out into the internet so it doesn't eat into your data plan.

 

Web Services Dynamic Discovery (WS-Discovery)

Another OS service used to find web services on the local network. No internet bound traffic, no data plan usage.

——————————

 

If you want to see the amount of traffic that actually goes out to the Internet, I would recommend to check your router/modem. Most have some form of management UI. For example mine has a screen that can show you traffic for the current and past month.

 

1) Technically you can install a caching DNS server on your local network so that most DNS queries are resolved locally instead of going out over the internet. E.g. Pi-hole does this for you. But otherwise it's a lot of work for very little gain. Pi-hole on its own will do more for you by e.g. preventing ads from loading which is probably multiple kB per web page instead of mere bytes for the DNS query.

[narrdarr]

18 minutes ago, Eigenvektor said:

I don't think there's much left to "fix" here. As I said you can configure Windows to tell it that you're on a limited plan. At the very least, this will prevent Windows from downloading updates when you're approaching the limit. This setting is also visible to other software, which means apps that are programmed to take this into account will also limit their traffic or even stop when you approach it.

 

Something else you can do to lower data usage: Install an ad blocker like uBlock Origin and/or use Pi-hole. My Pi-hole tells me it has prevented 20% of requests from going out, so you could say it has roughly reduced internet traffic by 20%.

 

Let's go over the items in your screenshot:

——————————

Hypertext Transfer Protocol over SSL/TLS (HTTPS)

This is normal internet traffic from your browser. Based on the icon, you can see that this was mainly from Firefox. Meaning it happens when you browse the internet. Nothing you can do here other than not using the internet. It could also be Firefox checking for updates. I would not recommend to disable auto-updates since that means you miss out on bug fixes and security fixes.

Other

The screenshot of the small Window you opened shows "NT Kernel & System" meaning this is most likely traffic from the OS itself. Not much you can do to prevent this, other than shut down your computer.

Multicast DNS (mDNS)

This is used to resolve host names on the local network (e.g. that of your printer). Meaning this traffic should not go out to the internet in any case, so it doesn't use up your bandwidth.

Domain Name System (DNS)

An essential service used to resolve host names like "linustechtips.com" to an IP address. Without this you can't use your browser and other apps that connect to the internet. It's usage will increase every time you visit a website. Nothing to do here⁽¹⁾.

Simple Network Management Protocol (SNMP)

This is used to monitor other devices on the local network (e.g. see the icon: your printer). This is local network traffic again. It doesn't go out into the internet so it doesn't eat into your data plan.

 

Web Services Dynamic Discovery (WS-Discovery)

Another OS service used to find web services on the local network. No internet bound traffic, no data plan usage.

——————————

 

If you want to see the amount of traffic that actually goes out to the Internet, I would recommend to check your router/modem. Most have some form of management UI. For example mine has a screen that can show you traffic for the current and past month.

 

1) Technically you can install a caching DNS server on your local network so that most DNS queries are resolved locally instead of going out over the internet. E.g. Pi-hole does this for you. But otherwise it's a lot of work for very little gain. Pi-hole on its own will do more for you by e.g. preventing ads from loading which is probably multiple kB per web page instead of mere bytes for the DNS query.

Thank you for the response and all the info.