Home | Site Map           
   
     

Web Hosting Bandwidth -- How Much Bandwidth Is Enough?


Bandwidth in its simplest terms refers to the amount of data that flows across a network wire in a given time period. For most web hosting providers, that time period is measured in a month. Web hosting providers are charged a certain amount per month or per year for an allocated amount of bandwidth from backbone providers and wholesale data centers. That cost is then passed on to the consumer in the form of web hosting plans.

How much bandwidth will your website use?

With so much variation among web hosting companies, it can sometimes be difficult to know how much bandwidth your website will need. So, how much is a gigabyte of bandwidth anyway? Let's put it in perspective. If an average web page, images and all is 50 kilobytes in size, your website could be viewed 20,000 times! For the average hobby website, that is more than enough. Let's further put that 20,000 in perspective. If each visitor to your website viewed an average of 4 pages per month, it would still represent over 5,000 unique visitors to your website every month. Now if your website has lots of pictures on it though, then one gigabyte of bandwidth will allow for fewer visitors.

Beware of bandwidth usage when offering file downloads

While offering simple web pages doesn't use up much bandwidth, the same can't be said about downloading files. If you plan on allowing people to download music files, pdf files, flash files, or video files, you can eat up bandwidth in a hurry even with a relatively small number of people visiting your website. If your website offers an adobe .pdf file that is 1 megabyte in size, with one gigabyte of bandwidth, you will only be able to serve up one thousand downloads. This does not including the html needed to get people to download the pdf in the first place.

Video files eat up even more space. A one megabyte video file represents only seconds of video. For a half hour presentation, your video file could easily be over two hundred megabytes in size! At that size, one gigabyte would only allow you to offer five downloads to your visitors. What you plan to do with your website most definitely will affect how much monthly bandwidth you anticipate needing.

Overselling bandwidth is common in the web hosting industry

Because more people use only a fraction of their allotted bandwidth per month, most web hosting providers price their plans knowing that most people will only use a fraction of the resources available to them. In fact, with most companies, if you did use the maximum bandwidth available to you each month, you would most likely be shut down. If you go with a shared hosting account, your website can be hosted with hundreds or thousands of other websites. If your website starts to use a significant portion of the server's resources, you may find them pulling the plug on your website. If you know your website is going to need significant resources, you should probably consider getting yourself a dedicated server or at the very least look for assurances in writing that your web hosting provider will honor your bandwidth needs.

Knowing what you plan to do will allow you to know how much you need

By knowing what you plan to do with your hosting account, you can have a pretty good idea of how much bandwidth you're going to need. If you anticipate that you will be needing to serve lots of multimedia including video, music and large amounts of flash powered pages, you may need to consider going with a dedicated server. If your website is just starting out and you have little money and no real idea of how much bandwidth you're going to need, pick a company that gives you more than you think you'll need at a reasonable price. Make sure you also find out how much they will charge you for any bandwidth you use above and beyond what comes in your hosting package. If it is one dollar per megabyte and you've already exceeded a twenty gigabyte bandwidth limit, changes are, you'll get one hefty bill at the end of the month. When shopping around and looking at bandwidth, keep the overage cost in mind as well and you'll do fine.

This article was written by Joe Duchesne, president of http://www.yowling.com/, a web hosting company that strives to make it easy to setup and maintain your website. Copyright 2004 Yowling. Reprint Freely as long as you link back to my website from this resource box.


MORE RESOURCES:

Yahoo! News Search Results for URL
Yahoo! News Search Results for URL

E-mail URL http://
Ukrainian Festival, Sunday, September 12, starts at 12:00 p.m. 3275 Elmwood Ave, Kenmore to celebrate cultural and ethnic heritage and traditions. Entertainment includes Ukrainian dance groups from Rochester, live music form Toronto, theme basket and raffles, children?s activities, and church tours.
SAJADAH TERAKHIR KARYA EDY A EFFENDI: SEBUAH ANALISIS SEMIOTIK MICHAEL RIFATERRE
BAB st1:*{behavior:url(#ieooui) }
MS probes mystery IE bug
URL shortening shenanigans Microsoft is investigating reports of a new bug in Internet Explorer.?
Nokia N8 launches September 30, says senior manager
digg_url = ' (function() { var s = document.createElement('SCRIPT'), s1 = document.getElementsByTagName('SCRIPT')[0]; s.type = 'text/javascript'; s.async = true; s.src = 'http://widgets.digg.com/buttons.js'; s1.parentNode.insertBefore(s, s1); })(); Digg '; Tapani Kaskinen is Nokia's Senior Comms Manager, so it's fitting that he'd be the first person from the company to ...
Google Power User Tips: SERP URL Parameters
In Part 1, we looked at query operators for refining our searches. Now for Part 2, let?s look at parameters that we can add/modify in the URL of the the Google SERP (search engine results page.)
Twitter's link logging will be a boon for businesses
Twitter is getting into analytics. Finally. This week, the microblogging service announced that it will be updating its URL shortener t.co to help alleviate malware problems and track link sharing on its service.
Dating in the Dark: Muscles and Manhandling
This week on ABC?s Dating on the Dark, the contestants learn that a person?s voice sometimes doesn?t match their body. Who will end up finding a spark in the dark? The guys (from left to right in the photo below): Chad, 33, works in catering and is a good ol? Texan at heart. Kyle, 25, is a [...] SHARETHIS.addEntry({ title: "Dating in the Dark: Muscles and Manhandling", url: "http ...
Top Chef: Producer Laughs Off Emmy Fall
On what was a shining moment for Bravo?s Top Chef as the show took home an Emmy Award, one of the show?s producers took a fall as she got up to head down the aisle. Erica Ross is not upset about all the videos circulating the web about her fall, but instead she laughs it [...] SHARETHIS.addEntry({ title: "Top Chef: Producer Laughs Off Emmy Fall", url: "http://realitytvmagazine ...
Dancing With The Stars: Bristol Palin Denies Diva Rumors
Bristol Palin has recently been deemed the diva of season eleven on Dancing With the Stars on ABC, with some even referring to her as the next Kate Gosselin. But according to Bristol, she is not being difficult or acting like a diva in any way. Keep reading to hear what she has to say! While [...] SHARETHIS.addEntry({ title: "Dancing With The Stars: Bristol Palin Denies Diva Rumors", url ...
The Biggest Loser: Meet Season Ten?s Contestants
If you are anticipating the return of The Biggest Loser on NBC, here is your chance to get a quick look at the season ten contestants. I am sure most of you are wondering whether or not there will be a contestant heavier than Michael Ventrella, the heaviest contestant in the history of the show?well, [...] SHARETHIS.addEntry({ title: "The Biggest Loser: Meet Season Ten?s Contestants", url ...

 

 

Foto Log | Perfect Laptop | Webdesign Place

Copyright © 2008 All Rights Reserved URLMaster.com