Datanet bandwidth & Backup Calculator

Bandwidth Calculator

Question 1: My pipe is 100 Mb so how much data can I transfer in an hour, day, week, month?

Answer:

• 30TB in a month (30 days) * see calculator above
• Few examples:
• 1Mb transfers 320GB in a month (30 days)
• 10Mb transfers 100GB per day
• 100Mb transfers 32TB per month

Question 2: How to work it out or QED quod erat demonstrandum?

Answer:
Well, there are 8 bits (lower case b) in a Byte (upper case B) plus 1 parity bit so we’ll call it 9 bits = 1 Byte. Data transfer is always measured in bits, the data transfers serially in bits, little “b” so 10Mb or 1Gb.

The data volume when reassembled in the pot (or on the hard drive) is measured in Bytes (=9 bits), big ”B” so 10GB or 2TB.

So a 100Mb pipe will transfer 100Mb per sec or 100MB in about 9 secs or 1GB in 90s or 1TB in 90,000s or * 30TB in 2,700,000s which is about 31 days or a nominal month.

Question 3: So where does it all go and what is typically consuming my bandwidth?

Uploading or downloading big files, anything over 10MB, will have some impact, especially on smaller pipes such as DSL.

Using the calculator above, a 1GB file will take nearly 5 minutes to download on a 30Mb DSL and, because the upload on DSL might only be 1Mb, uploading or sending that same 1GB fie could take over 2 hours – and in that time all other user’s experience will be impacted.

• Sending or receiving emails with large attachments, photos, data bases etc.?
• Streaming video on BBC iPlayer, cricket, football, rugby or YouTube videos?
• Inter site or inter office VPN traffic? Hosting a busy web server or application server in-house?
  
  Then you should host it in the data centre!

Question 4: What can I do to improve my bandwidth?

Answer:
Give us a call at Datanet on 01252 810010 to discuss your options, such as:

• Getting a bigger full-fat fibre bandwidth pipe.
• Ask Datanet to supply and configure a Fortigate NGF (next generation firewall) to monitor bandwidth usage.
• Have an in house policy cautioning staff about accessing non-business content or media.
• On a lighter note, have a look here at the news item “Need for Speed”.