repository refresh

[Hugo Notte]

Mint 12 KDE 64 bit & Mint 12 main 64 bit
I have noticed that the repository refresh done by the update manager is taking quite a long time. Somewhere in March or February the amount of data downloaded for that refresh went up to 30 MB. It seems that a couple of I386 repositories take 5-6 MB each in order to refresh. The problem with this is, that each time the system does a refresh, it either blocks the (slow) ADSL line (flat rate) for around 8 minutes per computer (X3) or when connected to the faster mobile broadband, eats a hefty data chunk and that becomes expensive.

Until some time early this year it hasn't been like that, the update manager's refresh would take less than half the time (=data). I have now already set the update manager to only check once a day. But even when I exit the update manager after boot up, the system still does what seems like a repository refresh within the first 40 minutes of running.

Any idea, how to get around this?
Any idea why the data amount has escalated? Many updates only need a fraction of the amount of data downloaded for the refresh itself.

Do other, non ubuntu based ditros have the same problem?

[arjot]

I am also having the same problem.

[Hugo Notte]

Bump

[DrHu]

Yes every so often, it is usually because of activity(of the repository), or that people are updating too often: everyone seems to want to grab the latest version of something (application(s)).

I don't think I have ever set an uptime schedule to be automatic: I like to decide if I need some update or not, and if I did, i would probably set it for 1 week or so for checking

In the main to avoid the rush of the first week that an update/refresh of an application set is available..

To get around it: partially

--you might want to find the fastest mirrors for Ubuntu, and reset your /etc/sources list to include them for the Ubuntu specific repository: which is probably about 90=% of the Mint set(s)..

http://apt-get.biffster.org/2011/05/14/how-to-select-fastest-mirror-in-ubuntu%C2%A0%C2%A0ubuntu-geek/

http://www.ubuntugeek.com/how-to-select ... buntu.html

[Hugo Notte]

DrHu,

thanks for your reply. However, we seem to talk past each other. I have tried different settings in the update manager: from once a day to 7 days to no automatic update at. I have even prevented the update manager from starting up at boot. There is no change in outcome: at least once a day, some time after boot up the system refreshes all repositories and downloads close to 30 MB of data.
What help would it be to select a faster mirror? At this stage my ADSL line is the limiting factor, not the speed at which any server could deliver the data. And I have already selected the closest mirror here.
The question is: how do I stop the system from downloading 30 MB of data? OpenSuse doesn't do this on a daily basis and Mint / Ubuntu didn't used to do this. For me it is a deal breaker!