There are a number of links in the chain which determined the overall performance of transfers between computers.
- server speed and the number of hits it is receiving . e.g. if your server has a 2Mbps link to the Internet and four people downloading files simultaneously they will get 500Kbps each.
- Link to the Internet from your server to your Internet service provider
- bandwidth of your Internet service provider to the Internet
- Internet link between the Internet service provider and the remote site e.g. the bandwidth of an international link between countries
- bandwidth of the Internet service provider of the client
- bandwidth of the client to the Internet service provider
- speed of the clients computer in handling the download
The download speed will be determined by the slowest link in the chain – this will be the bottleneck that need to be addressed