That's a strong word. What were you thinking?
That's a strong word. What were you thinking?
I’m linking my mobile hotspot to my desktop occasionally for testing or because I’m too tired to unblock a temporary firewall item. SYSTEM consumed 30gb of data in just 10 minutes. It happened yesterday, last month, and even then it was only 15gb. Microsoft uses about 270gb of mobile and LAN data each month combined. Why is that? It can’t be just updates anymore—it’s getting costly to keep expanding my monthly data allowance every single month. Because Microsoft can’t just ignore the issue [remember, my Windows usage jumped from 300GB to over a terabyte per month simply by running with the system alone, which accounts for nearly a third of my total].
Based on what I recall and others' experiences, system data consumption isn't limited only to Windows updates. Activities such as VPN connections are grouped under the "System" category since they don’t differentiate further. The positive part is you can turn on "metered connection" for each network individually. This tells Windows and apps it should limit data usage there. It won’t stop you from exceeding your data cap, because Windows and your PC don’t know about your cellular plan, but it will signal them to use less data when needed.
This is a big reason I A) keep my gaming Machine off unless Im using it. B) Have all my games set to update on launch. This way I can control the data usage. Like @kirashi stated you can set Windows to Metered mode, which will help. Ive never noticed that much data usage in Windows. But I have my LAN connection set to Metered, because we have a 1.2 TB data cap. It might be time to check out what you have installed and see what's using the data. Because 1 TB of usage in a month on one machine just seems a little suspicious, at least to me.