Bandwidth and disk storage are the two main commodities of any hosting package, and just like most other commodities disk storage and bandwidth don’t come cheap for the supplier. So if this stuff isn’t cheap, then why are we seeing more and more unlimited offers these days?

First things first. Disk storage (web space) is the medium used to store all your website files on, and the amount available depends entirely on how much money the provider has invested in physical storage. Bandwidth (in hosting terms) is the amount of data your web site can transfer over a period of time. With web space once you reach your disk storage limit you simply wont be allowed to store anymore files, but if you reach your monthly bandwidth allowance then your site becomes unavailable to your visitors and you’ll need to upgrade your hosting package or wait until the end of the month before people can start viewing your pages again.

This is where unlimited hosting packages claim to solve that problem. Don’t be fooled though, unlimited bandwidth and web space simply isn’t possible in the real world. I’m not saying that providers of unlimited hosting packages are crooks or liars, but what they are offering simply isn’t sustainable long term. These companies/individuals will often have special terms and conditions relating to exactly what you get with your ‘unlimited’ package as well, which may include restrictions on file sizes, no video or audio storage, a maximum number of visitors per month and other restrictions which may make your hosting deal a very limited experience indeed. Unlimited doesn’t necessarily mean a poor service either, some of these providers are simply trying to get business and this is definitely one way to get your attention.

Bandwidth costs the supplier by the megabyte (which they then sell on to you), this means that if their claims were true and they had hundreds of clients then they’d be running at a huge loss every year. Just look at the big name hosting providers, they don’t usually offer unlimited bandwidth or web space because they’ve either learnt from past experience or simply have sensible business skills from the beginning. Most providers (even some of the big names) also rely on the fact that not everyone will use more than a few gigabytes of bandwidth per month, which leaves plenty left over for the hardcore users and a handful of bandwidth abusers.

Here at digitalSURGERY.net we keep things realistic, our hosting package has been tailored for optimum performance, it provides adequate storage for your files and offers a generous 5 gigabytes of data transfer (bandwidth) per month. We can increase bandwidth and disk storage when your web site needs it, this is to save you money and helps us keep our servers at optimal performance.

This entry was posted by Lee on Friday, December 16th, 2005 at 1:46 pm and is filed under Hosting. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.