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Chapter 3 E-business infrastructure 163

The speed is also governed by the speed of the network connection, commonly referred
Bandwidth to as the network ‘bandwidth’. The bandwidth of a web site’s connection to the Internet and
Indicates the speed at the bandwidth of the customer’s connection to the Internet will affect the speed with which
which data are
transferred using a web pages and associated graphics load onto the customer’s PC. The term is so called
particular network because of the width of range of electromagnetic frequencies an analogue or digital signal
medium. It is measured in occupies for a given transmission medium.
bits per second (bps).
As described in Box 3.7, bandwidth gives an indication of the speed at which data can be
transferred from a web server along a particular medium such as a network cable or phone
line. In simple terms bandwidth can be thought of as the size of a pipe along which infor-
mation flows. The higher the bandwidth, the greater the diameter of the pipe, and the faster
information is delivered to the user. Many ISPs have bandwidth caps, even on ‘unlimited’
Internet access plans for users who consume high volumes of bandwidth for video streams
for example.

Box 3.7 Bandwidth measures

Bandwidth measures are in bits per second where one character or digit, such as the
number ‘1’, would be equivalent to 8 bits. So a modem operating at 57,600 bits per
second (57.6 kbps) will transfer information at 7,200 characters per second (57,600/8).
When selecting an ISP or hosting provider it is important to consider the bandwidth of
the connection between the ISP and the Internet. Choices may be:
ISDN – 56 kbps up to 128 kbps
Frame relay – 56 kbps up to a T1 communications channel (1.55 Mbps)
Dedicated point-to-point – 56 kbps up to T3 (45 Mbps): connected to the Internet
backbone.

kbps is one kilobit per second or 1,000 bps (a modem operates at up to 56.6 kbps)
Mbps is one megabit per second or 1,000,000 bps (company networks operate at
10 or more Mbps)
Gbps is one gigabit per second or 1,000,000,000 bps (fibre-optic or satellite links
operate at Gbps).

Table 3.5 shows that the top five sites with the lowest download speeds tend to have a much

lower page size or ‘weight’ compared with the slower sites from 95 to 100. This shows that
the performance of a site is not simply dependent on the hosting with the ISP, but depends
on how the site is designed. Such a system is known as a content management system
(CMS). As explained in more detail in Chapter 12, a CMS is a means of managing the updat-
ing and publication of information on any web site, whether intranet, extranet or Internet.
The CMS used can also make a big difference. However, viewing these slower sites over a
broadband connection shows that this is perhaps less of an issue than in the days when the
majority, rather than the minority, were dial-up Internet users.