Traffic tracking accuracy

Maybe this is just my lack of experience from using data usage meters, but I have tried 3 different meters and compared them, and they all report pretty drastic differences in the amount of data used. I use Netbalancer to limit bandwidth on a per-application basis. The amount of data reported by Netbalancer reports a fairly drastic difference than what the application usage from Networx reports for the same application over the same usage period. I threw in DUMeter in the worx, and it too reported drastically different usage than networx. I both had DUMeter and Networx configured to Ignore local traffic. I know you can't speak for these other applications, but I'm just curious why data usage reported by Networx would be different from these other meters?

How much is drastically? 10%, twice, tenfold?

I would say probably about 10% - 20% difference.

Since I can only speak for NetWorx, the 10% different may be explained as follows:

1. When any LAC traffic is ignored in NetWorx, it does not record packet headers also known as TCP/IP overhead.

2. When any LAN traffic is ignored, it includes Windows broadcast messages.

The best way to find out the truth is to download a file of the known size, and see which meter's readings match. Or even better, which one better matches your ISP's report.

I found 5.1.6 version the most accurate i.e. within 30MB over 25GB for the monthly BigPond usage. Used every version since up to and including 5.2.9 with both Win XP ans Win 7 64 (2 ethernet and 1 wifi PCs through a single modem/router). Each time had to come back to 5.1.6 so missing on new features but accuracy is more important in my case. Great application, been using it for quite a few years now. Thank you.