Okay folks this is a easy question and I would like an opinion poll as well as a open answeres here....i hope this benefits others more than it does me



1. Is there truly such a thing as unmetered hosting???

2. Is it even feasible or profitable for myself or for anyother hosting provider to offer this kind of service??

3. Is there any difference between a company that offers unlimited vs unmetered transfer on hosting???

4. Now from a business standpoint folks.......I have an opportunity to go with a company that offers me unmetered bandwidth and 5gb of storage @ $44.99.....my current guy I go with offers me 2gb space and 40gb of transfer @ $34.99 a month......I could get a server from RACKSHAK that costs me $99.99+ for a rather big 60gb hard drive but a measly 700gb of transfer.......wheres the logic and medium for me to choose between these three plans??

5. These webhosting forums seem very attunned to those companies posting ads or about unmetered and unlimited hosting.......now if this is possible why is it a problem for these boards??

6. Heck I know im not the only business person out here that has come up with this problem when coming up with my business plan and out to operate my web hosting company but damn has any ever been thru this and what was your outcomes???

7. Personally Id like nothing more than to never worry about my "bandwidth" seeing as i think its all another scheme and way for us all to get richer as the other guy gets poorer.....as a community id like to think that unmetered anything should be a blessing.



well skip the poll folks but id sure like your help and maybe a couple of bones :D

I don't believe there is any such thing as "unmetered hosting". I do not think it's feasible, and if it was, your profit would be a negative. No there is not a difference.

Well your unmetered bandwidth would be as much as he has, and it's probably not that much, so... I would ask how much he has on the server as well.

I have been through it, I decided to quit all my expenses and work for a web hoster. Now I am a technician and web designer when needed.

My suggestion to you is, you buy your own server from RackShack, and use what they give you. Rackshack is a very trustworthy company, and these other guys could be scamming you.

Okay folks this is a easy question and I would like an opinion poll as well as a open answeres here....i hope this benefits others more than it does me



1. Is there truly such a thing as unmetered hosting???


Yes, unlike Unlimited bandwidth, unmetered is more than possible. For instance, if you had a 10mbit unmetered connection, you could get a estimated 3120 gigabyte of bandwidth a month, around 312gig per mbit.

(I'm not looking to argue the validity of the numbers with anyone, they are estimates, however fairly close estimates.)


2. Is it even feasible or profitable for myself or for anyother hosting provider to offer this kind of service??


Of course it is, imagine how many users would purchase a 10mbit unmetered connection than use less than 50% of their capacity, a sustained 10mbit/s isn't easy to do for a lot of smaller hosts. Rackshack charges $349 for a 10mbit unmetered connection.


3. Is there any difference between a company that offers unlimited vs unmetered transfer on hosting???


Definately. Unlimited bandwidth is implying that you can use however much bandwidth you want, that the amount of bandwidth is limitless.

Unmetered implys that they are not going to monitor your bandwidth and you can use however much is possible on your line. The difference is Unlimited is however much you want, Unmetered is however much is possible. Now if a shared host offered unmetered, this is COMPLETELY different.


4. Now from a business standpoint folks.......I have an opportunity to go with a company that offers me unmetered bandwidth and 5gb of storage @ $44.99.....my current guy I go with offers me 2gb space and 40gb of transfer @ $34.99 a month......I could get a server from RACKSHAK that costs me $99.99+ for a rather big 60gb hard drive but a measly 700gb of transfer.......wheres the logic and medium for me to choose between these three plans??


I do not support Unmetered bandwidth in a shared enviorment, I just don't feel it's overly possible, first let's put it this way, in order to hit 700gb of transfer you will have to use roughly 2mbit/s. Let's say your host who offered $44.99 had 50 customers on that machine. If everyone who had unmetered bandwidth pushed 3mbit/s and it was a 100mb NIC, you would have problems.

Or if one customer pushed 60mbit/s (it's unmetered right?) with shared, read the TOS I'm sure it has exceptiosn in there.

A critical part of this, is I am assuming that these unmetered on shared enviorments have a 100mbit NIC, they could have a 10mbit.

I would recommend a $99/month deal for 700gb, that's effectively 2mbit/s



5. These webhosting forums seem very attunned to those companies posting ads or about unmetered and unlimited hosting.......now if this is possible why is it a problem for these boards??


Unlimited is not possible, and highly frowned upon, Unmetered is possible for a dedicated server (for the most part.)


6. Heck I know im not the only business person out here that has come up with this problem when coming up with my business plan and out to operate my web hosting company but damn has any ever been thru this and what was your outcomes???


Can't help you here.


7. Personally Id like nothing more than to never worry about my "bandwidth" seeing as i think its all another scheme and way for us all to get richer as the other guy gets poorer.....as a community id like to think that unmetered anything should be a blessing.


Well, remember, at $50 per mbit you effectively pay for about 70% usage for Unmetered , on Rackshack's Unmetered plan you are paying ~$35 per mbit if you use your full 10mbit/s which we all know is impossible. With the 700GB plan, you are paying about $50/mbit if you were to use your full 700GB a month.

I hope this all makes sense, like I said earlier, I'm not looking to argue numbers with anyone.

I would prefer to rent a dedicated server, definately. Even if it is a Celeron. At least you get control over everything.

Andre

If I were you, I'd find a host that has a good server that's not full (almost empty). If a host has an "unmetered" or "unlimited" transfer/storage offer ... then they're just the wrong type of host you'd want to be with.

I don't understand the term 'unmetered'.

Let's say you have a 10Mbps connection - surely that's 'metered' to ensure that you only get 10Mbps, even if it's 'metered' at a hardware level. They're just 'metering' your bandwidth as opposed to your data transfer.

I think the term 'unmetered' is just a marketing ploy to attract the eye. Either you get metered by bandwidth or you get metered by transfer.

'Unlimited' is, of course, just a lie.

metered = measured/counted/billed

not limited :)

If you are unmetered that means yes you are limited (like I said) however you are not billed per mbit.

Oh, in that case all hosts can claim they run umetered accounts. Few hosts meter a customer's bandwidth, they just limit their transfer to a certain amount per month.

I think the term 'metered' in hosting is synonymous with having a bandwidth limit instead of a transfer limit.

I think the term 'unmetered' is just a marketing ploy to attract the eye. Either you get metered by bandwidth or you get metered by transfer

You are right and dispite what some people seem to think it is only a small step above offering unlimited in the ethics book. It is still misleading to the clients because none of these hosts offering it properly explain it.

One more critical negative of unmetered bandwidth to note is the fact it will almost always be Cogent-Only.

So bandwidth quality is a concern as well...

It could be of any bandwidth quality. The problem with "unmetered", and forever will be is there will always be someone who takes advantage of that "unmetered" bandwidth. No it's not "unlimited" but imagine someone using legitimate unmetered bandwidth. If they fill up your network with legitimate traffic then the connection will be slow, and you will experience downtimes. I believe, having monitored several "unmetered" hosts, that the problem of offering unmetered is just that. There are still no limits (aside from the speed of the connection).

The only way you can receive "unmetered" bandwidth, and quality service is if you have your own dedicated server. If you're sharing a server with several other clients, how do you know that they won't "abuse" the bandwidth available? There are no limits therefor they could use up the whole network just as easily as you can.

This host you're currently looking at, what kind of a connection do they offer? How many people do they place on a server? Is there any clause in their TOS that states if you use up too much bandwidth you will be booted from the service. If you're site suddenly explodes in popularity can they guarantee you won't be shut off? It's unmetered right? You don't pay bandwidth overage fees, therefor why is there any risk? Unmetered to me leaves too many unaswered questions, and gives you no comfort in knowing that you have control over your business.

Yes "unmetered" hosting is "one step up" from "unlimited" but don't be fooled by it, the same "abuse" rules apply. If you use too much you will be booted. It's just not viable.

Unmetered bandwidth with a 10mb/s is meant as: as much as you can pull out of the 10mb/s connection.

The whole "unmetered" issue is an issue of semantics. It all depends on what you mean by "unmetered": who is doing or not doing metering over what time frame. When I am at work, my time is not metered by my boss checking what I am doing every five minutes. On the other hand, should I decided to leave at noon instead of 5pm you can be sure my time is metered and I will hear about it.

"Unmetered" isn't the lie that "unlimited" is but it certainly can (and is usually intended to) be a misleading term...

Daniel