In web hosting, a marketing rage in the past few years has been the offer of unlimited space and bandwidth. The only thing I can think of offhand, that is really unlimited - is time. What kind of servers are these sites being hosted on anyway? What’s the largest hard drive physically available? If I wanted bandwidth at 1129 Tbps, would that be possible?
There are real physical limits on bandwidth and space.
The bandwidth available to data centers in the Midwest is different than the bandwidth offered, for example, in NY, Dallas, LA and Chicago. Data centers have to pay upstream providers for the bandwidth they offer to their clients. Some upstream providers with varying latency on their network price out lower or higher than others. Data centers routinely offer a blend of 3, 4 or more providers through BGP (Border Gateway Protocol), but can offer a preferred network with failover to a blended network - significantly reducing the end client’s bandwidth cost.
Are unlimited plans at $3.99/Month realistic?
In one word - NO. I’ve yet to find one offer of unlimited space and bandwidth at any price that doesn’t have a corresponding TOS and AUP that addresses the specific bandwidth and space allowable. So why do so many hosts offer these packages? It’s all about perception of value - to the unsuspecting general public. The offer sounds fantastic, until you buy into the plan and get canceled by that provider for violating some clause of their TOS. I read threads every day of the week posted in forums on the Internet by unsuspecting clients - wondering why their account was canceled by host xxx?
Compare this to your own business.
Do you find that managing your prospects expectations works out best? That ‘never needs sharpening’ knife isn’t really going to last forever, is it? Here’s a simple question to ask any provider that offers unlimited bandwidth. What size uplink port do you offer? Whether its 10 or 100Mbps or GigE, does that relate to a finite amount of bandwidth monthly? Unlimited - not hardly! How many other users are sharing that port? How saturated is that provider's bandwidth?
There are real physical limits on bandwidth and space.
The bandwidth available to data centers in the Midwest is different than the bandwidth offered, for example, in NY, Dallas, LA and Chicago. Data centers have to pay upstream providers for the bandwidth they offer to their clients. Some upstream providers with varying latency on their network price out lower or higher than others. Data centers routinely offer a blend of 3, 4 or more providers through BGP (Border Gateway Protocol), but can offer a preferred network with failover to a blended network - significantly reducing the end client’s bandwidth cost.
Are unlimited plans at $3.99/Month realistic?
In one word - NO. I’ve yet to find one offer of unlimited space and bandwidth at any price that doesn’t have a corresponding TOS and AUP that addresses the specific bandwidth and space allowable. So why do so many hosts offer these packages? It’s all about perception of value - to the unsuspecting general public. The offer sounds fantastic, until you buy into the plan and get canceled by that provider for violating some clause of their TOS. I read threads every day of the week posted in forums on the Internet by unsuspecting clients - wondering why their account was canceled by host xxx?
Compare this to your own business.
Do you find that managing your prospects expectations works out best? That ‘never needs sharpening’ knife isn’t really going to last forever, is it? Here’s a simple question to ask any provider that offers unlimited bandwidth. What size uplink port do you offer? Whether its 10 or 100Mbps or GigE, does that relate to a finite amount of bandwidth monthly? Unlimited - not hardly! How many other users are sharing that port? How saturated is that provider's bandwidth?
