Page Download Size [Poll]

It doesn't matter if you do all the error checking in the world, or if you have the most beautiful graphics, if your site or application design isn't usable, it's not going to do well. Get input and advice on usability and user interface issues here.

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On average I shoot for a site that is:

30k or less
11
65%
50k or less
2
12%
70k or less
1
6%
90k or less
1
6%
100k or more is fine
0
No votes
Who cares about page size?
2
12%
 
Total votes: 17

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neophyte
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Page Download Size [Poll]

Post by neophyte »

Sometimes it's hard to strike that balance between look and speed. I've been pondering how many K is reasonable for an average page. I'm not talking about gallery pages or flash content. I'm talking about typical pages: images, content, css, js all included - What do you shoot for? Is 30k too much? Do you try for under 100k? Or is download size not matter you consider at all on your projects? I've been on a small kick lately -- odd for a designer. I've been trying to see how much look I can get for 30k. How bout you?
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nielsene
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Post by nielsene »

You're saying on average, right? Definitely under 30k. Once the images for the themes and css is cached, your average had better be under 30k..... If you have 30k of html on a page its probably either a mammoth page, or you have tonnes of extra cruft hidden in it. Looks like most of my html pages are about 4-8k, CSS is 5k and images are about 14k combined...(but I'm not much of an artist so they compress nicely :) ) But there's plenty of hooks in the css/markup for sprucing up the layout... So I'm under 30k as it is even if the images are reloaded on every page.

If I were a better graphic artist, I'd suspect the image total would be closer to 30-45k, but that should be only a one-time cost.
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hawleyjr
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Post by hawleyjr »

When I first started webdesign ('98 or '99) I was told to never make a page over 90k. Now, with over 1/2 of online users using high speed. It really depends what type of site you are making and who your audience is.

From http://www.websiteoptimization.com

TOTAL_SIZE - Warning! The total size of this page is 201525 bytes, which will load in 40.36 seconds on a 56Kbps modem. Consider reducing total page size to less than 30K to achieve sub eight second response times on 56K connections. Pages over 100K exceed most attention thresholds at 56Kbps, even with feedback. Consider contacting us about our optimization services.
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neophyte
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Post by neophyte »

Yup that's the conundrum: which half of the 50% gets the shaft? Although lately I've been of the opinion that it takes a great design to justify the band width and or wait. If I see another sci-fi/metal site like the one the onion made fun of... http://www.theonion.com/2056-06-22/ I think I'll gag.

Incidently the speed report on that is:
TOTAL_SIZE - Warning! The total size of this page is 441103 bytes, which will load in 87.91 seconds on a 56Kbps modem. Consider reducing total page size to less than 30K to achieve sub eight second response times on 56K connections. Pages over 100K exceed most attention thresholds at 56Kbps, even with feedback. Consider contacting us about our optimization services.
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s.dot
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Post by s.dot »

With CSS expanding nicely, tables can have rounded borders (and regular borders of course) without the need for images. Neat tricks like a drop shadow can be done on text (and even elements with proper use of <div> tags). This has cut most of my already small pages even smaller. I'm a believer in content over beauty. :-D

Simplicity is not a drawback, but rather an advantage. ;)
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pickle
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Post by pickle »

Almost 100% of the work I do is on an internal intranet, so I don't care about page size.

For website design, I first make the page look how I want it. Then I tweak and tweak until I make the page as small as possible, without an appreciable decrease in the appearance.
Real programmers don't comment their code. If it was hard to write, it should be hard to understand.
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AnarKy
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The importance of loading times

Post by AnarKy »

The importance of loading times is dependant on the nature of the application. :?

For example – one of our Clients uses a web based billing system…
This system has thousands of users which service about 5 million customers with lots of data. Here, the response time is extremely important and we are always trying to improve this.

On the other hand, I don’t mind waiting some time for my favourite sites to load. :wink:
theda
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Post by theda »

You do realize you can easily speed up page loadtimes by converting all images (using a good image program, like Photoshop) from all formats to .jpg and then back to their original format? Yes, you loose a tiny bit of quality (but in Photoshop, you loose a lot less quality...), but it can speed up image download by 10x.

Conforming to W3C standards also helps speed things up. If you don't have miscellaneous <span style='color:blue' title='I&#39;m naughty, are you naughty?'>smurf</span> that ends up slowing things down... you don't have as much of a loadtime.
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