Hosting & Bandwidth

Other Articles in this category : Hosting & Bandwidth  |  MS Internet Explorer: Not the Only Game in Town  |  Ounces of Protection

---

Hosting - Bandwidth explained

Many Internet hosting providers make the claim that they offer unlimited bandwidth. This simply can't be true, as no one has unlimited bandwidth, and someone eventually has to pay for it (this is the largest expense for any Internet company hosting your website). If you set up a site which chokes a provider's Internet connection, they are either going to make you pay for it, or simply shut off your site. Either way, it is going to lead to a rather embarrassing situation.

For those who just read that paragraph and feel that they could have gleaned as much from reading a sanskrit text, I'll provide a quick explanation of what it is that I am referring to.

Every time that someone goes to your web site, they download the images off your hosting provider's server, and onto their own PC. This transfer causes data to be sent over the provider's Internet connection, which is only of a finite size ..... just like your modem operates only at 28.8 or 56Kbps, while a provider operates at many times that speed, there is still a physical boundary as to how much data they can fit in their pipe to the Internet before it gets clogged.

One way to avoid this clogging is to "meter" the traffic. Generally this is done by offering a certain quota as part of the account, and then charging extra for transfer beyond the quota.

Figuring out your requirements is pretty straightforward. Suppose that your front-page has two 5K images on it, and receives 100 visitors. That would mean that each visitor downloads 10K of information over your provider's Internet connection, and in aggregate:

10K x 100 = 1000K = 1MB

So as you can see, it would take an enormous amount of visitors before you start racking up high amounts of traffic.

1 to GB of traffic is ample for 98-99% of the web sites out there. If you look at a price guide for a provider and see fees for exceptional amounts of bandwidth, do not be turned off. Instead you should realise that this shows a certain amount of maturity on the part of the provider, and should actually be an indicator

that this provider has a handle on the business, and knows what's involved. If your site ever does exceed 1 - 2GB of traffic in a one month period, be very happy. This means that you have been astoundingly successful in promoting your site, and chances are that at that point you're doing some serious business through the net.

As for the provider's connectivity, at this point don't even consider a provider unless they have at least a T3. Multiple T3's are nice, but in most cases are frivolous and generally not even properly set-up to reap the benefits of multiple connections. The real point to this comment is that don't assume that since a provider advertises multiple T3's that they automatically have incredible amounts of bandwidth at their disposal. Most providers set up a second Internet connection to act as a backup for their primary connection, and no traffic at all passes over the second connection unless their primary link goes down.

This used to be a major concern, but as the net has advanced, major outages in Internet connections has declined to practically nothing.

The important lesson here is really that a T3 connection does not necessarily mean that a provider has a 45Mbit connection,though that is certainly what the provider would like you to assume. Bandwidth on a T3 can range anywhere from 4Mbps up through 45Mbps. Most providers operate at lower speeds with the capability to burst during periods of higher traffic. Remember - not all T3's are created equal.

The determining factor in how fast your site will load depends on the link utilisation. A site running off a 45Mbps connection running at 95% capacity will actually run slower than a site running a 10Mbps connection operating at 30 - 40% capacity. When a link goes beyond 60 - 70% utilisation, latencies begin to appear on the line.

Good questions to ask potential providers are: What speed does their Internet connection run at?

What percent utilisation do they have?
How is this monitored?
What upgrades are planned?

The answer to the last question may be ambiguous, especially if the provider's link has low utilisation, but if they plan to be in business for a while, they should have some plans to support their growth.