What is bandwidth measured in

While modern protocols are pretty good about not losing any packets, limited bandwidth can still cause operations to be too long to complete, resulting in timeouts or other issues. These issues can cause application errors or database errors.

When backing up or copying data over a network, too little bandwidth can cause backups to take too long, often running into other batch processes, or even main working hours. In addition, users relying on a connection with too little bandwidth may notice long lag times between when they do something, like click a button, and the response to that action.

In the case of waiting for information or other data to load, too little bandwidth can cause operations to take a long time, or even cause users to give up waiting. For users attempting to make phone calls over a network, such as Voice over Internet Protocol VoIP , having too little bandwidth results in lower quality calls.

Most VoIP systems reduce the fidelity of a call based on the available bandwidth. If the quality is bad enough, there may be actual gaps in the call where parts of the conversation are missed. Video calls require even more bandwidth. Video calls made without the necessary bandwidth will not only result in bad sound quality, but also low quality or jittery video. If the connection is too slow, users will either have to wait a long time before the video starts while the system buffers a lot of data, or the video may stop suddenly when the system runs out of buffered video to play.

Gamers are often frustrated by limited bandwidth as well. While playing against other players online, players with faster connections see what is happening quicker, and the data about their reactions is transmitted and received faster.

There a few technical issues caused by too much bandwidth. Higher capacity bandwidth, however, typically costs more.

Thus, too much bandwidth may not be cost effective. Network design and infrastructure can create bandwidth issues as well. Latency measures the delays on a network that may be causing lower throughput or goodput. A low latency network has short delays, while a high latency network has longer delays. Finding and remedying bandwidth issues helps improve network performance without costly upgrades.

Tools such as Ping and traceroute can help troubleshoot basic issues. Pinging a test server, for example, will return information on how quickly data can be sent and received, as well as average round trip times. High ping times indicate higher latency in the network. The traceroute tool can help determine if there are too many individual network connections, or hops, along the connection path.

In addition, traceroute returns the time taken by each hop. A longer time on a single hop may pinpoint the source of an issue. TTCP measures the time it takes for data to travel from one network interface to another with a receiver on the other end. This eliminates the return trip from the calculation and may help pinpoint issues quickly.

If the measured bandwidth is less than expected, further measurements can isolate the issue. Does a measurement to another interface on the same network work faster? If so, where is the difference between the two systems?

By continually measuring bandwidth, administrators can target the bottlenecks in the network. With its data gathering and graphing interface, PRTG can also help troubleshoot bandwidth problems that are not related to design. For example, by measuring bandwidth usage over time, it may be determined that certain users or applications are sometimes using higher amounts of bandwidth and causing network congestion and slowing network responsiveness and internet speed for other users.

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Customer Login. Search Search. IT Explained: Bandwidth. Back to index. Content 1. What is Bandwidth in Computing? Expressing Bandwidth 3. Measuring Bandwidth 4. Bandwidth vs. Speed vs. This is the time it takes for a packet to reach its destination, and it's critical to some applications like voice over internet protocol VoIP. Having lots of devices on the connection route or other bottlenecks along the way can increase latency, affecting network speed. If latency varies too much across a session, you might experience jitter, which is a problem for sensitive applications such as VoIP or video conferencing.

Jitter stems from factors like network interference or poor network signals. You might find this on Wi-Fi or cellular connections, but electrical activity from storms and even high-powered electrical motors can affect copper cabling. When people talk about measuring bandwidth, they're often really talking about throughput.

Most throughput tests use a similar method, sending a series of packets to a destination and measuring the response time over a set period to get an average. Broadband throughput measurement tools often give you different metrics. Some wide-area broadband connections will often offer asymmetric bandwidth, meaning you get more capacity for data downloads than for uploads. The best testing tools will break these out for you. Another common metric is the ping speed, which measures the round trip for packet delivery.

As a rule, you want ping speeds of 20ms or less for VoIP calls, although you can get tolerable results at up to ms. You'll find plenty of broadband testing tools online, some of which come directly from carriers like Comcast and Xfinity. Still, you can also get independent versions like Ookla's Speedtest. Broadband speed testing tools won't all deliver equal results, which is why it's best to use either your ISP's testing tool or an independent speed testing tool like Ookla's.

For example, the Comcast Business testing tool put my latency at 67ms, whereas Speedtest said it was at just 4ms. Similarly, Comcast said I uploaded at 22Mbps, but Speedtest put it at over 10 times that. Comcast measured my speed by connecting me to a host over 2, miles away, presumably on its own network, while Speedtest connected me to a server in a city 62 miles away and on my ISP's network.

These things matter when it comes to network throughput. The configuration on your side of the router also matters when assessing throughput. Even though your broadband connection might be consistent and predictable from your router outward, the devices on your network and how they're configured will affect the last few yards between your router and the endpoint device you're testing on. Testing your broadband throughput using your regular network setup will give you a picture of your throughout under real network conditions.

Then you can test it under ideal conditions by removing as many variables as possible from the testing process. One way to do this is connecting directly to your internet modem or gateway via an Ethernet cable, circumventing any switches, hubs, or Wi-Fi. Use a machine with a gigabit Ethernet network interface card NIC to ensure the machine can support higher-bandwidth connections like fiber.

Now is also the time to test the bandwidth between various points inside the LAN, especially if you notice a big difference in broadband throughput when testing under real network conditions with lots of other clients using the network. Reading the NICs' on your sending and receiving machines and the supported speed of any network equipment in the middle will give you a theoretical bandwidth. In reality, though, your mileage may vary depending on factors, including how many other devices are on the network, how much bandwidth those other devices are consuming, and what network equipment, such as hubs or Wi-Fi connections, are supporting them.

Latency is sometimes referred to as delay or ping rate. It's the lag you experience while waiting for something to load. If bandwidth is the amount of information sent per second, latency is the amount of time it takes that information to get from its source to you.

Throughput is how much information actually gets delivered in a certain amount of time. So if bandwidth is the max amount of data, throughput is how much of that data makes it to its destination — taking latency, network speed, packet loss and other factors into account.

If you have multiple devices and several family members on them at the same time, you'll need more bandwidth to keep up. Streaming, gaming and other high-capacity activities demand a certain amount of bandwidth speed to get the best experience without a lot of buffering or lag. The FCC provides a set of guidelines for Mbps needed based on digital activity. For example, if you love to stream 4K content, you'll need 25 Mbps at the very minimum and Mbps for telecommuting or gaming.

See FCC guide. Now that we've answered the question what is bandwidth, how do you know how much you have and if it's enough? If you love to stream HD videos, download large files and enjoy multiplayer gaming, you may want to consider speed plans of Mbps and above. For all other activities like streaming music, surfing and video conferencing - anything above 25 Mbps should be enough. It all depends on how patient you are with potential buffering and slightly slower speeds when others at home are competing for bandwidth at the same time for their own activities.

Use our speed test tool to see how your current provider compares to Fios. There are a number of ways to increase your bandwidth and get the most from your internet and devices.