Newbie With Data Usage Questions - iPhone 5

Hi all!

I just upgrated from a pokey iPhone 4 (32GB) to a 5 (16 GB). In order to get the free upgrade, I had to re-up my Verizon plan and lost my ulimited data and now am starting with a 2 GB monthly plan I use the phone primarily for:

1. Listening to music at work (no wifi available).

2. Listening to Podcasts in the car (again, no wifi).

3. Listening to Audio books in the car (still, wifi-less).

Problem 1. Since I have about 2000 songs in the Cloud, I do not want to suck up too much data by streaming the music (if that does indeed suck up a lot of data). But I also do not want to put too many songs in the phone since I have a smaller capacity (now only 16 GB and my music is about 8GB on its own).

Problem 2. I have read horror stories about the phone dropping wifi even when it is available. I have heard that when the phone hits sleep mode, the wifi turns off leaving me to LTE. Is this true? If so, I can imagine that auto-downloads/updates can happen when it's "sleeping" causing a data suck.

Can anyone give me their experiences/tips to limit data usage while still enjoying the facets of the phone (music through iTunes Match and Podcasts and audo books through Audible)? I may have to up my plan but I would like to see if the 2 GB plan is possible with my usage habits.

Thank you!

It's impossible to guess your data usage I'm afraid. But you can monitor it in Settings - General - Usage

I've never had the wifi drop out on my iPhone 5 when decent wifi was available. At worst I've had it slow to a crawl on poor wifi but never drop it. There are no 'auto downloads or updates' to worry about

AT&T has a method of telling you your data usage on a monthly basis which is a good guide of seeing how much data you are using. Check if Verizon has something similar (and with capped plan they really should have something)..

Verizon does offer the same thing. Just log on to Verizon wireless with your user info and it will give you your data usage as of the last time it recorded it.

Thanks everyone. I am set up for auto-notification for 50%, 75%, etc. and, funny enough, I got a 50% "prorated" notification yesterday. Apparently the last 9 days of my billing cycle has a prorated capped data (I shouldn't expect anything else from flippin' Verizon - haha). But part of my previous questions were sparked by some chatter online about odd data happenings. See this link...

IPhone 5 WiFi bug leads to giant cellular data overages - Oct. 1, 2012

I am wondering if these concerns have long since been addressed by an update?

Thanks!

If you read the article, there is a link to a Apple article that tells you how to update the Verizon carrier settings to deal with this issue. Furthermore Verizon has indicated, per the article, that they wouldn't charge customers for unwarranted overages..

With capped plans, it's a good habit to get into checking on your usage only a weekly (or more frequent if you're constantly on the cellular network doing stuff) to see where you stand to avoid issues. That way you can immediately spot any unwarranted usage and report it and get it resolved as opposed to waiting for the end of the month and the inevitable overage charge..

It's hard for me to know if I have the latest Verizon update since I just bought got the phone a few days ago. When I check the settings-general-about I do not get the update pop-up. Does anyone know the latest Verizon version number?

That Apple article is dated Sep 30, 2012 so it's a good bet that any phone sold in the last few months has been updated.

Once again, unless you're seeing unreasonable data usage, you shouldn't worry..

You could certainly pre-load podcasts, music and audiobooks onto your device if you find that all that is using too much data. I never stream podcasts or audiobooks, but I do stream internet radio stations sometimes. I probably don't stream on 3G as much as you do, but I have 1GB data and have never gotten even CLOSE to using it all.

Check to see if your carrier has an app available for iOS to monitor usage. Mine does (at least for Android) and it's a convenient way to quickly check how much data is being registered by my carrier. This is probably a better way to measure data usage since, although mobile OSes can measure traffic (and these figures seem to be quite different from carrier values sometimes), it's ultimately what the carrier registers, not the phone that matters.