In an apparent ode to Rebecca Black, Ice Cube and any number of body switch movies, Netflix has had an incredibly active Friday, so sit back while we get you up to speed. Sony Pictures movies from Starz Play are no longer available (on any device, not just the Xbox 360 this time) due to a "temporary contract issue" according to the official blog. According to NewTeeVee, the problem is an "IP distribution cap" that was reached due to Netflix's explosive growth, but with no word on when the movies will be back, you'll be missing The Other Guys. Up next was the National Association of the Deaf, which has filed a lawsuit in Springfield, MA against Netflix, claiming that its failure to provide closed captions on all streaming content puts it in violation of the Americans with Disabilities Act. Netflix last claimed 30 percent of titles were subbed with plans to reach 80 percent by the end of the year, but the press release (and captioned YouTube video) make the case that as a leader in streaming video, it should do better.

Netflix also quietly gave US subscribers access to the same bandwidth management options provided to Canadians a few months ago. The new Manage Video Quality settings (shown above) can be found in the Your Account section, and if you're trying to stay under bandwidth caps or just keep seeing buffering, they should help you out at the cost of a few pixels. As if that wasn't enough, the Netflix Tech Blog squeezed in news that it was ending access to "DVD-related features" for apps using its Open API later this year. The move is apparently preparation for expanded international streaming, so if you're trying to manage discs through a third party things may change soon.

Netflix's day: Sony movies pulled, new bandwidth options, no more DVD API access and a lawsuit originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 17 Jun 2011 23:29:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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The second bit of news for Canadian Netflixers in less than 24 hours deals with the other pressing issue facing the service in the Great White North: bandwidth caps. While they exist in the U.S., many Canadian ISPs have set the max amount of data allowed at much lower levels and they may cut further if a recent CRTC decision on usage-based billing stands. In response, starting today Netflix.ca accounts all have a new Manage Video Quality setting that lets users select Good / Better / Best bitrates as defaults for their video streams. According to CPO Neil Hunt's blog post, previously watching 30 hours of Netflix would typically consume up to 30GB of data, while now it can be as low as 9GB under the "Good" setting. Of course, dropping bitrate means lowering picture quality accordingly, despite promises that "the experience continues to be great." Even with HD and 5.1 audio available, PQ probably isn't your highest priority if you've turned to streaming, but it remains to be seen if customers find the compromise suitable, and whether a similar option comes to U.S. users facing similarly limited connections.

[Thanks to everyone who sent this in]

Netflix Canada announces new bandwidth management settings for capped users originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 28 Mar 2011 23:09:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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SYMPTOMS
EDIT: I believe this is not triggered by data usage as several people with low usage has also been hit by the cap.

I am unsure whether this is triggered by data usage or otherwise but here are the symptoms:

1. The caps appear to be hard caps. There is NO fluctuation in speed, it just appears as if it’s maxed out at 50 kB/sec. Some 4 mbit users report being capped at 200 kB/sec and I have a 512 customer being capped at about 25 kB/sec and saw some 1 mbit customers having the same thing. It does look like an intentional cap as they are in common multiples.

2. No appearance of packet loss

3. Speedtests to local servers except Cyberjaya are fine but speedtest to Singapore/Cyberjaya/any other outside server shows the hard cap speed.

4. This appears to be indiscriminate as it applies to ALL types of international transfers be it http/P2P/FTP.

HOW YOU CAN HELP

Don’t waste your time with TM’s customer support. They are ill-informed and don’t have any idea of this problem.

Best is to go directly to the SKMM and open a complaint there and hopefully with enough genuine complaints, we can force some action out of this hugely unethical and possibly unlawful throttling.

LYN REPORTS:

Many LYN Reports also appear to show the same thing:

badang_1785
MrComot
disket
figure8
myandylai
ericee9
huh?
Hornet

Sample of report of speedtest

I have been experiencing the same problem of connection slowdown for almost 24 hours. ive tested with different ip’s, eg. 60.50, 60.49, 60.52, 60.53, 124.82 all to no avail. ive tested my connection and noticed that ;

a) tm speedometer gave me full normal speed of 1.5 Mbps ;

b) speedtest.net speedometer gave constant 0.5 Mbps to all international servers ive tried ; singapore, UK and US

c) speedtest.net speedometer to Penang, KL and Seri Kembangan gave good, full speed of 1.5 Mbps

d) speedtest.net speedometer to Cyberjaya however gave 0.5 Mbps only

e) ping tests to international websites were around 250ms-350ms

f) a torrent download from ipt with more than 150 seeders got stuck at 0.5 Mbps only with either VPN, bolehroute or direct streamyx connection

g) upload speed to all servers anywhere were around 0.3 Mbps – 0.35 Mbps

ive concluded that something was wrong with tm’s routing so ive called up their support line earlier this evening. opened up a report about this and the technician said *probably* theres something wrong with the routing since she cant event re-set my port connection; the system would not respond. below ive got some example ;

direct connection speedtest to singapore;

direct connection speedtest to UK;

direct connection to US;

direct connection to Penang, KL and Seri Kembangan;

the odd part, speedtest to Cyberjaya;

the above results are the same with other ip ranges as i stated above.

*Credits to Reuben* Taken from http://forum.lowyat.net/topic/1648653

To check this up u need to access your modem WEB Gui connect directly modem to your PC if ur gateway address is 192.168.1.1

Go to i.e or firefox browser type http://192.168.1.1  <– certain modem have different default ip address checkup your Modem Manual for instruction.

Pls note that u also can check how fast the ISP Capped your speed . If you subscribe to 1 Mbps the ISP should capped you at 1024kbps or 1524kbps. Having caps higher speed is better because u can enjoy higher speed but most ISP now capped ur speed via ur username example if u have 1 Mbps the best speed u can got is around 1.5 Mbps even though the isp capped you at 4024kbps

They are also certain issues when people subscribe 1 Mbps but the ISP capped their line at 512kbps so they can’t enjoy the true speed of their broadband. Using this tips u can check yourself whether you are capped at the correct speed.  Please note if ur ADSL is bad having high caps will have your attenuation noise higher that will cause DSL light to blink that’s why u have to read this tips.

Sample of 1 Mbps line Quality

SN Margin (AKA Signal to Noise Margin or Signal to Noise Ratio)
Relative strength of the DSL signal to Noise ratio. 6dB is the lowest dB manufactures specify for modem to be able to synch. In some instances interleaving* can help raise the noise margin to an acceptable level. The higher the number the better for this measurement.
> 6dB or below is bad and will experience no synch or intermittent synch problems
> 7dB-10dB is fair but does not leave much room for variances in conditions
> 11dB-20dB is good with no synch problems
> 20dB-28dB is excellent
> 29dB or above is outstanding

Line Attenuation
Measure of how much the signal has degraded between the DSLAM and the modem. Maximum signal loss recommendation is usually about 60dB. The lower the dB the better for this measurement.
> 20dB and below is outstanding
> 20dB-30dB is excellent
> 30dB-40dB is very good
> 40dB-50dB is good
> 50dB-60dB is poor and may experience connectivity issues
> 60dB or above is bad and will experience connectivity issues