Web Hosting Talk : Web Hosting Main Forums : Dedicated Server : Bandwidth Costs broken down

[gellomonkey]

Hello All I am new to the forum here and I need some help. I have seen alot of posts about bandwidth but they are all recommendations for companies that provide various levels of bandwidth.
How come some companies are offering gazillion TB's of bandwidth and other offer so little. For example hostatreedotcom offers up 6TB for their base dedicated server, servergurusdotcom offers 10TB and then other companies like godaddydotcom and lunarpages offer 500GB and 2TB respectively.

How come some companies offer oodles of bandwidth and other do not. Whats the difference? And can anybody recommend a good US based host that offers decent bandwidth?

Help is much appreciated.

[RJohnson23]

Some companies will oversell their bandwidth since most customers won't use it all. That's not to say that the less bandwidth you get, the better service you will get. How much bandwidth are you looking for and what's your budget?

[WebhostGIANT-Rob]

How come some companies offer oodles of bandwidth and other do not. Whats the difference? And can anybody recommend a good US based host that offers decent bandwidth?

I think you aware about number of web hosts in the United States. But not all of them use decent network providers.
You said you wanted decent bandwidth. You meant you wanted good ammount of guaranteed bandwidth or fixed connection speed. What exactly are you looking for?

[httpEasy]

Bandwidth has nothing to do with performance. Run a weird script and you'll get suspended no matter what's your allocation. By the way, what would be your requirements?

[fwaggle]

The reason bandwidth allowances vary so wildly is because bandwidth allowances are very very loosely tied to network capacity, and network capacity is how providers are typically billed themselves.

Eg, you can have a 3.3TB allowance on a server, let's say $100/month (forgive my math here if it's wrong, it's late.. run the numbers yourself if you're not sure). If you had a constant trickle of data, that'd work out to about 10mbps all day long. Let's say $5/mbps is what they're being charged, so you're costing them $50/month in bandwidth.

Now let's say you have that same allowance, and you use 5% of it regularly, but at times you'll burst to the full ability of your 100mbps port. Disregarding 95th percentile billing for the moment, your provider could be spending $500 on bandwidth for that $100 server, and you may not even go near your allowance.

Note that these are extremes and pretty unlikely in real world usage... in reality, between 95th percentile billing, and the fact that having enough capacity for many users will result in a lot of unused capacity, so they can put their commitment somewhere in the middle, it's a lot safer for the provider - but there still is that tiny chance of discrepancy.

The reason some folks provide 1TB bandwidth and some can provide 100TB is simply a result of how much capacity they have, and how low of a rate they negotiated on that capacity. Some people are paying $15/mbit, some are paying $1.50/mbit - and that's not even for good bandwidth vs crap bandwidth! It's not just a case of buy 100TB and sell 100 x 1TB though, which might be what's causing the confusion.

As far as finding a good host, that's no easier or harder when you take into account bandwidth... simply scan the offers forum for an offer that sounds good, check reviews on them. Rinse + repeat until you find a host you think might be a good fit.

[Dan Madiou]

How come some companies offer oodles of bandwidth and other do not. Whats the difference? And can anybody recommend a good US based host that offers decent bandwidth?

The companies which offer you more then they can provide are oversellers!
Stay away from them.

[fwaggle]

Originally Posted by Dan Madiou

The companies which offer you more then they can provide are oversellers!
Stay away from them.

That's a pretty ignorant statement man... it's wrong on like three or four points, I think.

1) Overselling isn't "offering more than you can provide", it's balancing capacity with the average use to ensure that everyone can get what they need without having to have 100% capacity for every client.

Your phone company, your water company, your electric company... they all oversell, and it makes smart business sense because if your electric company had to maintain the capacity for every house to turn on every appliance all at once, your bill would be a lot higher.

2) How would a client know what a company can provide and what they can't?

3) As I said above, the insanely high allowances offered by some companies aren't all reached via overselling. 100TB is a pretty good example, they offer a huge bandwidth allowance and judging by the number of people who can actually use it, I'd say they're not relying on overselling to make money.

4) To continue in that vein, there are companies who offer huge bandwidth allowances and are doing great, and there are companies that offered very sane bandwidth allowances and went under. Read my entire post above, it's because the cost of bandwidth vs the cost they sell it for are somewhat disconnected.

[vantage255]

Originally Posted by fwaggle

That's a pretty ignorant statement man... it's wrong on like three or four points, I think.

1) Overselling isn't "offering more than you can provide", it's balancing capacity with the average use to ensure that everyone can get what they need without having to have 100% capacity for every client.

Your phone company, your water company, your electric company... they all oversell, and it makes smart business sense because if your electric company had to maintain the capacity for every house to turn on every appliance all at once, your bill would be a lot higher.

Overselling is a usable business model. But their is a limit. If I ask for a 100Mb burstable port and the entire switch that I am on, shared with 40 other customers, has only 100Mb.. then I am not going to get what I want. and this is VERY common. Overselling works if done inteligently, but the only real way to see this is by visiting the facility.

Originally Posted by fwaggle

2) How would a client know what a company can provide and what they can't?

By visiting the facility.....

Originally Posted by fwaggle

3) As I said above, the insanely high allowances offered by some companies aren't all reached via overselling. 100TB is a pretty good example, they offer a huge bandwidth allowance and judging by the number of people who can actually use it, I'd say they're not relying on overselling to make money.

No WAY that 100TB isnt overselling. It simply would drive them out of business to not be. Not that this is a bad thing. They may do it well and with proper perspective on their customer base and its needs. But they ARE overselling.

Originally Posted by fwaggle

4) To continue in that vein, there are companies who offer huge bandwidth allowances and are doing great, and there are companies that offered very sane bandwidth allowances and went under. Read my entire post above, it's because the cost of bandwidth vs the cost they sell it for are somewhat disconnected.

Every company has a profit center. Some simply dont mind loosing money on bandwidth because they make money somewhere else.. As long as they make enough to keep the service quality high and to stay in business..... I am happy.

[fwaggle]

Originally Posted by vantage255

Overselling is a usable business model. But their is a limit. If I ask for a 100Mb burstable port and the entire switch that I am on, shared with 40 other customers, has only 100Mb.. then I am not going to get what I want. and this is VERY common. Overselling works if done inteligently, but the only real way to see this is by visiting the facility.

Agreed, but notice the post I was responding to...

No WAY that 100TB isnt overselling. It simply would drive them out of business to not be. Not that this is a bad thing. They may do it well and with proper perspective on their customer base and its needs. But they ARE overselling.

I've no idea how much capacity 100TB has, but they apparently have no shortage of users who go well up to capacity and beyond and they still seem to be doing okay. If they're overselling, they appear to be doing it well, so who cares?

My point is that you can't rule a company out just because they offer a really good deal.

[vantage255]

Originally Posted by fwaggle

My point is that you can't rule a company out just because they offer a really good deal.

Very True.