Please Help- Windows 10 Is Maxing Out My Data Limit

I live in a very rural area. The only internet options I have are dial up and Wildblue, a dish service similar to Hughes net. I have a data limit of 12,000 mb download within a 30 day rolling period. This used to work okay for me until I bought a refurbished PC off of ebay and ever since my data usage has stayed so maxed out I am hardly able to use the internet. The refurbished system has Windows 7 on it but was sold with the Windows 10 upgrade. The system I replaced had been running Windows 8 and didn't used data like this. We keep the internet cable unplugged when we aren't online and I think I have disabled to peer to peer update feature but I'm unsure. Can someone PLEASE help me figure out why my computer is burning up my data and how to make it stop. I have no idea where to start. Any help will be greatly appreciated!

 

You can turn off virtually all the Win10 services that 'report' information to Microsoft that does use data when connected to the internet. The simplest way to do that is to run O&O Shut Up 10 and in the top bar 'Actions' choose 'All recommended and limited recommended' changes. Create a system restore point first, apply the changes, then RESTART your system so they take effect. You will have to rerun it every time Windows Updates are applied as they reverse many of them.

The other thing are START UPS - apart from any Firewall and AV program there should be no need for any start ups at boot.
You can see them in Task Manager > Start Ups
If you need any help on which ones to disable post a clear focussed screen shot of them so that they can be easily read. When opening Task Manager > Start Ups screenshot them by the alt+PrtScr and it will only picture that window - minimise anything else while doing that. Make sure you can read each entry in the screenshot before posting it ('upload file') here.
Alternatively you can see start ups in CCleaner Slim > Tools > Start Up and at bottom right click 'send to text file' and upload that instead
There may be other things using your data and there are small free programs to monitor that from here: http://www.majorgeeks.com/mg/sortname/monitoring.html

 

Max has given your the main info-
If you turn on metered connection -that will stop a lot - Full info here
https://support.microsoft.com/en-us...71a243305a7/metered-connections-in-windows-10
You can also turn off Microsoft updates, and turn back on again, when you have spare data
Click search- type In services - scroll to windows update, double click , or, right click -go to to properties, click stop, when it shows as stopped- click disable.
Simple enable, when you have sufficient free data .

 

Win 10 has built-in features that can help you to understand and measure what is using your internet connection. It isn't perfect but it's a lot better than nothing. THIS article explains it well.

 

There is also W10 Privacy it is much more extensive but you will not have to rerun it every time there is Windows Updates. It is a one time thing unless it blocks something you use inside Windows 10. The only thing I noticed with this program is that in the beginning it asks you to set a restore point through the program but it seems to always fail. So I just create my own manual resort point which isn't that hard. Other than that it works great and it is very detailed. Just about every option it provides it gives you the description of what that function does on the computer. Just hover your cursor over the option and it will give you a brief description. Hope this helps.

HumbleServant1611

 

Don't forget to check your other devices, even a fitbit will gobble up data if it is synced to your phone.

 

I just wanted to tell all of you thank you so much for your help! It took me a few days before I could get the O&O Shut Up 10. I had to download it to my phone an then bring it home and put it on my desktop. It has made a huge difference! I am going to work through the start ups as well to see what that does. Again, thank you!!!