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more computer questions
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I hope you all don’t get tired of me & my questions. These are more about internet/data usage. We live in a rural community so we have a wireless “hotspot” device for the laptop. Last month we very nearly went over our plan so I have been monitoring data usage closely this month. The device is supposed to be protected by a password, but does that really work? The reason I ask: I had spent at least an hour one day (maybe two?) entering resources in the CMO, looked around it yesterday & printed from it, as well as email & maybe a couple other sites. The data total from that was 1.07 GB. Tonight after children were in bed I was fixing some resources/schedules in the CMO and reading SCM forum posts for 1.5 to 2 hours. Not sure of exact time, but when I go to turn off the hotspot it said that the laptop had used 4.07 GB (total)! Does that sound reasonable? We use a tablet far more often than the laptop and it doesn’t use near as much data! We do have near neighbors; could their devices be using our internet connection despite the password? I don’t understand much about technology & it frustrates me. This makes me want to cry because I really want to use the CMO in our homeschool. I have been typing this on my little flip-phone which, fortunately, does not use much data.
I don’t know much about technology, but through experience have learned that our laptops use a lot of data through a hot spot, especially new ones. Part of the problem is that the computer automatically updates software every time we are on the Internet. You can change some of these settings to ask you before it updates.
I use my phone for most everything.
Hth.
Yes, a laptop running Windows will often retrieve updates which can be quite large. If you’re using an older version of Windows (XP, Vista, 7), it doesn’t understand the difference between normal Wi-Fi and metered (i.e. limited) connections such as a mobile hotspot. Newer versions (Windows 10 or 8) do and will usually avoid doing system updates over metered connections to avoid incurring charges.
As was mentioned, you can change these settings so updates don’t occur over your mobile hotspot. The very important thing to think about, though, is that those system updates are crucial for security purposes. So if you have opportunities to take your laptop to another location with Wi-Fi to download the critical updates, that would be one option to keeping your system up to date.
My son says that laptops have a lot of programs running in the background that take more data than a tablet and even more data than a phone.
I hope that made sense.
Yes, it makes sense but still frustrating. Thank you, Tim, for the explanation. I will try to go somewhere for the updates from time to time, but like you said, retrofam, I don’t always know when it is doing that. I can use the tablet to check work in the CMO, but need to print from the laptop. I figured the laptop would be easier for me to use when entering/scheduling resources b/c I do not like the touch screen. I guess I’ll try it though. Thank you both for your response!
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