11. Space and Bandwidth

OK, one more thing to talk about.  That's bandwidth and space.

Bandwidth is how big a pipe you have coming out of your hosting server (or computer).  Consider from your home, low bandwidth would be dial-up service while high bandwidth would be a high speed access over cable or DSL.

Space is the disk space you have to put the files you need for your site.  Not enough space would mean you wouldn't be able to add that extra page without deleting something.

Plus, there is much more to consider.

Bandwidth is the more complex subject, so let's knock off the easier one first.  Space.

Disk space to store your files has become relatively cheap and the text and formatting of your site requires only a little space.  For example, this site uses less than 1G (gigabytes) of space, or at least that is how much it required the last time we checked.  1G (gigabyte or 1,000M) is a lot of space.

Now if your site is going to contain videos, high resolution pictures or gaming, then that's a different story.  But most sites do not require as much space as you would expect.

Bandwidth is a much more complex issue.  There are a lot of factors that effect the performance you actually see.  Let's use the plumbing analogy where bandwidth is a pipe.  The higher the bandwidth, the wider the pipe.

When someone requests a page from your web site, the server needs to put it into the pipe.  If the server is very slow, it doesn't matter how big a pipe you have, the page is going to be coming out very slowly.  So is a faster server the answer?  Well, that is always nice, but you also need to consider how much memory the server has, what else is running on the server, how everything is configured, if your pages are optimized to download and display quickly, etc.  Your page hasn't made it into the pipe yet, and there are many factors in how quickly it can be downloaded.

Once the page is in the bandwidth pipe, the size of the pipe gets the page into the internet at the given speed.  Once on the internet backbone, the path to your computer will have pipes of all different sizes - the smallest pipe in the path defines how quickly the page gets to the customer.  

Of course, a page displaying the same page can be built different ways - some methods are faster than others.  For example, using a picture for the page will make it easy to develop and display properly on different browsers, but it will appear slower than a page developed using better engineering techniques.

WOW, is there anything that doesn't affect performance?  Actually where it is hosted isn't a worry - it really depends on the network path from the hosting server to your computer (the speed of light is pretty quick). If the path from the other side of the world isn't busy, has plenty of bandwidth, the servers aren't busy, etc, then the performance could be better than a hosting company down the street.

So, how much bandwidth is enough?  The frugal approach is to go with a lower bandwidth and see what you think.  It is true your site may appear fast (or slow) to you, but it may appear the opposite to your customers.  That said, if your site appears to be fast enough in comparison to your competition, then we have one thumbs up.  If you ask friends, family and customers how your site is performing compared to your competition, then we have the second thumbs up.  Life is good.

If your site does not appear to be fast enough, then bandwidth can be increased.  With this approach, you're only spending enough to achieve your goals.