By itself, Netflix exceeds traffic for P2P file sharing, Web browsing, and real-time communications. By specific source, it far outpaces BitTorrent (at 11 percent) and YouTube (10 percent). Guess Comcast was throttling the wrong technology, eh?

Put that in perspective — that means one out of every four packets headed to an Internet user’s computer is delivering Netflix content, a pretty stunning ratio. It also is the biggest contributor to all real-time entertainment traffic, which is about half of all downstream data being delivered.

Could Netflix be ready to become the iTunes of streaming? I think so–and it may be all the more reason why Apple may want to throw its own hat into the ring.

With ISPs moving lately towards bandwidth caps, I wonder how much longer this growth in traffic from Netflix will be allowed to last. Executives were up in arms a few years back about how BitTorrent was clogging their pipes, but now it seems as if legal content is what’s now the biggest threat to bandwidth. Ain’t that ironic?

This week: Solutions for some of the computing troubles and annoyances you’ve asked me to fix.

I Can’t Get Online!

The Annoyance I can’t access the Internet. Outlook times out, my browser says it can’t connect, and Norton’s security app won’t update itself. Now what?

The Fix You know what a schmendrick is? It’s defined as someone who’s written a dozen troubleshooting articles, a book about PC annoyances, and spent hours helping other sort out their computing tsuris, and then can’t get online himself.

Yep, it was me spending a day trying everything I’ve ever recommended — rebooting the router, rebooting the cable-modem, and checking each and every ferschlumiting cable. I used System Restore and tried WinSockFix (in Win 7, do it manually: From a command line, type netsh winsock reset catalog, hit Enter. Then type in netsh int ip reset reset.log hit, hit Enter and reboot.).

I tried standing in the corner of the office, whistling a happy tune while spinning on one leg. The dogs loved it, egging me on, but I was still offline .

The rub, the utter frustration in this day-long effort, was that every so often I’d get online. That’s the bane of troubleshooting — inconsistent, varied results.

Right about now my smarter-than-me tech friends are saying, no, probably shouting at the monitor, Idiot, Try Another Computer. Oh, yeah, right, of course. What a dope. I did and, of course, same problem.

The brouhaha ended when I called Charter and they found an almost sliced line at the pole, perfect for intermittent access.

The lesson, which I’ll promptly forget, is — repeat after me — include calling your ISP when troubleshooting.

Quick: Turn Off my Monitor

The Annoyance I go to a lot of meetings and have to keep my notebook on, even though it’s not being used. I use a screensaver to turn off the monitor and not drain the battery. I’d rather a way to just turn the monitor on and off. –Harry Montgomery, by e-mail.

The Fix Those meetings drone on, don’t they. Too bad you can’t play Portal 2, the hot new game, while pretending to pay attention. I’ve got three freebie solutions.

Some notebooks have a series of keystrokes that’ll blank the monitor. Find out how it’s done by digging into your notebook’s help file. It’ll give you something to do at your next meeting to keep you from dozing off.

The tool I use is Saver Starter. It gives you four hotspots, one at each corner of the monitor; hover the mouse on a targeted spot to start the screensaver, which you’ve configured to be a blank screen. The hotspots can be turned cold — keeping your mouse on the spot stops the screensaver from activating.

If you don’t want anything fancy, and don’t want to bother with a screensaver, try Turn Off LCD. Click the icon on your desktop and the monitor’s off; hit the space bar and you’re back in business.

Configure your screen saver using Saver Starter.

I Hate the TouchPad!

The Annoyance I just got a new Asus work computer, but it has an accursed Touchpad. I hate the things — they mess up my typing unless I’m super careful, which I’m not. — Gavin Burgess, by way of Broad_band.

The Fix The very first thing I did on my ThinkPad was successfully disable the bloody TouchPad with TouchFreeze. The other freebie to do the job is TouchpadPal. Neither worked for Gavin.

Gavin also tried disabling the device — it didn’t help — nor did deleting the driver (nah, he said, it re-installs itself, just like a virus).

The clue for members of Broad_Band, a technical help YahooGroup was the fact that the notebook’s built-in function-key disabler on Gavin’s notebook didn’t work. K-Squared and Ivan T. both suggested calling Asus tech support. Problem solved: The notebook needed a free, quick-to-download chipset update.

FYI: Subscribe to Broad_Band, a terrific spot for free and smart tech help, and a forum I help moderate.

[This post is excerpted from Steve's TechBite newsletter. If you liked it, head here to sign up--it's delivered right to your inbox, and it's free.]

Actually “data caps” isn’t accurate. They’re not caps at all. They don’t cork up your DSL or fiber line when you hit your plan’s magic number. Say you do–AT&T just dings you with an extra service fee. AT&T U-Verse customers ride free until they hit 250GB a month, while AT&T DSL customers top out at 150GB. Go over those marks, and you’ll now pay $10 a month more, plus $10 again every 50GB thereafter.

Think of it more like a data threshold, then.

Trouble is, you have to poke around AT&T’s website and unearth customer service terms and usage FAQs to find that info. The company’s tucked it discreetly away, probably hoping it won’t scare customers who might opt for uncapped alternatives (like Verizon’s FIOS).

What AT&T ought to be doing, is laying out those monthly thresholds in its U-Verse and DSL service comparison tiers. The days of “unlimited data” are bygone, and high volume data customers could well incur substantial monthly extras. They need to know what’s what before signing up, and with that information fully disclosed, not asterisked to an FAQ link in tiny eyeball-wrenching print, bottom of the page.

I’ll give AT&T this: At least they’re not data throttling. I’ve had that sorry experience with satellite providers (Wild Blue, the worst of the worst) and international broadband ISPs (while living in the UK) and it’s wretched. Once you’ve been throttled, just getting a single HTML-only web page to load can take minutes. It’s like surfing with a 14.4k modem (remember those?). No one wants that. At least AT&T’s still in essence saying “have all you can eat.” Now the heaviest users just have to pay a little extra for it.

What I’d like next, speaking as a U-verse data guzzler myself, is to see AT&T offer some reassurances about where the extra money scraped from the so-called “top 2% of customers [using] about 20% of the total capacity” is going. Paying more doesn’t make anyone’s DSL or U-Verse connections go faster or mitigate congestion, nor does it necessarily deter that 2% from using the same amount or more as media streaming and data downloading services flourish.

But it could be money that’s invested in widening the data lanes–or laying new ones. And that’s what has to happen, since services like Netflix and Hulu are just the tip of the spearpoints held by a potential consumer phalanx of billions.

(This post republished from Techland.)

If you recall, we recently picked up a new (old) house and our plate is full of projects – including some relevant to a digital media blog. So, on with the story…

I’ve continued to make progress removing and recycling speaker and aerial antenna wire as I encounter it. There’s no way I’ll extricate it all, and fortunately I’m not quite OCD enough to have to. But it’s no longer an eyesore in various built-ins and closets.

The Verizon FiOS experiment continues, although we had a very slight set back last week when the contract crew missed their 9:30 – 10:30 appointment to bury the fiber. As I had to get into work, the company sent out a manager so I could go over an alternate run through the yard that wouldn’t sever our custom drainage system in three places. After some debate, he relented and marked my route. However, when the crew eventually arrived that afternoon they weren’t satisfied with the electric and copper markings in the neighbor’s yard (where the phone box resides), which put the project on hold over the long Christmas weekend. On Monday, the utilities were (re)marked and the line went in. As far as I can tell, they pretty much followed my path although I’m not sure how they handled the single drainage pipe they’d have to bypass. But cable, electric, and water continue to function – so I’ll call it a success.

While the fiber’s been dropped at the existing Verizon phone box, I’m hoping the installer can run it straight into the house so as to skip the sullying of my new siding (expected next week at the earliest). Worse case scenario, I hope I can convince him (or her) to remove the copper box and put the fiber one in it’s place. And, speaking of that siding, the company was a little put off when we chatted yesterday (regarding their delay) and I requested a few minutes of the project lead’s time before or during the install so I could discuss what I don’t want reattached. Given their initial reaction, I may be the one on the ladder removing the coax run so they’re not liable.

Lastly, in honor of the holidays, we caught Elf via Vudu on our temporary bedroom television. And while the speakers leave a lot to be desired and the set “boots” a tad too slowly, I’m fairly impressed with the 26″ Vizio Internet-connected TV. Netflix streaming and Vudu VOD without the clutter of another box is quite nice and Vizio’s wireless streaming capabilities have been extremely reliable. Although, at the end of the day (or spring), this TV will still most likely move to my basement lab/office.

(This post republished from Zatz Not Funny.)

City-owned power utility EPB said Monday that it would be able to deliver the ultra-fast speeds by the end of the year. The company had originally announced in June that it would deliver speeds of 150 megabits per second over its 100% fiber-optic network, but apparently the company’s decided to go all out.

Ready to sign up? Better have a big pocketbook. The gigabit service will set you back $350 per month — making it prohibitively expensive to all but mid and large sized businesses and the wealthy. But even its own executives have admitted they really don’t know how to price the offering — so I don’t think it would be all that unreasonable to expect the price to come down fairly soon.

It will also have a little more guidance later this year after Google makes its expected announcement on where it would build its own ultra-high speed network offering similar speeds. The company pledged to cover 500,000 people in the US with fiber-optic Internet earlier in the year. 1,100 communities applied as a result.

So you may ask, “why are they doing it if it’s so darn expensive?” From EPB CEO Harold DePriest comes the best answer I’ve heard from a executive in quite awhile: “Because we can.”

This compares to a 8 percent increase in both 2007 to 2008 and 2008 to 2009. The slowdown may have something to do with the economy, however it probably also means that the market is beginning to saturate, and those that want or need broadband are already subscribed to it.

Another key fact in the study is that overall, US adults believe that the expansion of broadband should not be a priority, with 52 percent responding that way. Interestingly enough, seniors are the most against it with only 21 percent saying it should be a priority and 64 percent against, and respondents aged 18-29 the most supportive with a 48-46 split.

The only demographic group to show a major uptick in broadband usage were African Americans, who saw 22 percent year-over-year growth. The so called digital divide is also narrowing: it is down to an 11-point gap from 19 points the year previous according to the study.

The full report’s PDF can be found here.

The “universal service obligation” would be handled by about 26 different nationwide providers who would offer service around the country. It should not be too difficult: Finland is one of the world’s most wired countries, but only about 26 percent have a broadband connection–about the same as the United States.