Being spoiled by a cable modem, I can't answer this question myself.

My website currently contains small thumbnail pictures (180x135 pixels) that when clicked open to a larger (640x480) full sized picture. Doing this is chewing up webspace that I get from my ISP and I'm almost full, so I had to come up with a new idea if I were to continue to expand. Thus, I am rebuilding and eliminating the large pictures. The thumbnails are being replace by a larger (320x240) non-clickable picture.

Here's my question....How long are you willing to wait for a webpage to load? One minute? Two minutes? More, if you think the content is worth it? (and by definition, lighthouses are)

The software I am using (FrontPage 98) tells me how long it should take a page to open on a 28.8k connection. I'm trying to keep the pages under 2 minutes (which should equate to about a minute on a 56k connection).

Thanks for you help.

Can't tell you about the dial-up modems anymore, Larry. But I would recommend updating to the most recent version of Frontpage - Definitely MANY improvements over 98.

One of them is being able to update only certain files -- like the ones you just finished editing.

John

Larry, you might want to do some market research and open a question to the site visitors. Ask them about what type of internet hookup they have and go from there.

Speaking as a poor guy who deals with dial up, I won't wait 2 minutes for any page to load. If it's not up in 30 seconds or less I have probably moved on. That also includes threads here in the forums where people post lots of oversized pictures. Maybe others are more patient than I.

FWIW,

Dave

There are lots of different metrics to gather and weigh when gauging performance and lots of different variables. It is difficult to measure accurately the entire chain of events from initial request to rendering the returned result.

Be that as it may, most of the usability studies I've seen suggest people start getting impatient after 7 seconds. If they believe the content is valuable they're willing to wait twice that long for a particular page, but not page after page. Some people will wait longer, some less.

Comparing your site with one of the large commercial portals, such as Yahoo, should give a reasonable benchmark for expectations.

T

I'm not an impatient person and I'm usually not in a hurry to get things done when it comes to using my home computer. I'm still with AOL on a dialup modem. It seems to connect up at 46666 bps each time I sign in. I do not use my computer for any type of business. That's fast enough for me. I want to slow my life down a little. Time is going by too fast as it is.

:rolleyes: Bob :rolleyes:

I am probably the best free cell player on earth.
I pull up a site and start the card games while I wait.
I too only wait on information I really want to see. Anything really weighted I will wait and open it up at work where we have fiber optic cable.

I recall an article I read recently that said that a suevey of computer users showed that the vast majority of people who have a 56k hookup are satisfied with it and have no intention of moving up to a broadband connection.

I was satisfied with a 56k connection at $7.95 a month until my son returned from CA. He upgrades me to a Cable Modem. It is now very difficult to use a 56k connection.

It's always harder to go backwards.

Dennis

Dennis

Larry, I'm on dial-up and have no problem with your photos. Everything seems to come up rather quickly. I tried one that was still clickable to a larger version and that photo came up pretty fast too.

Usually with sites that have multiple, smaller thumbnails I'll click to enlarge those that look interesting to me but if that takes tooooo long I'll just squint at the thumbnails or look elsewhere. Or as Daniel says, do something else while I wait if I feel that the photo's worth the wait.

Generally, with ANY kind of connection, the speed of loading images is slow the FIRST time, but should be much faster the next time.

Your browser should be set to check the cache first for each specific image that it has viewed in the last XX days or since the cache was last dumped.

So if you are evaluating the speed the SECOND (or THIRD, etc.) time you viewed the image or thread, then the speed should not be an issue at all.

Rather than ask a site visitor if they are willing to wait for X minutes to view a page, it would be better to direct them to a NEW (never viewed) page and ask them if the load time on that page was "acceptable" or "took too long".

You could create a series of three pages with either a different size/quality image or a different number of images on each and ask the users the same question about each of the three -- was it "acceptable" or didi it "take too long".

Remember as you create JPEG files, that the SIZE of that file can vary greatly. Create an image 500 pixels in maximum dimension and save it at various file sizes (4,6,8,10,12) all at 72 dpi. Then see how much larger the highest (12) file quality is compared with the 4 or 6 quality image. Most people cannot tell the difference between a 6 and an a 12 quality image.

Generally, people are a poor judge of how long something actually took, but they can tell you if the wait was 'worth it'.

With FrontPage, it's easy to create thumbnails (you can also control the dimension size of the thumbnails). So you could include clickable thumbnail images on image-intensize pages instead of the larger size images.

One other issue -- how a page appears to a visitor depends greatly on the setting of their display -- 640x480 (low end) to something like 1280x960 (high end).

Rod Watson created a way to detect the display setting of each visitor and then directs them to pages especially set up for that display setting. Lots of extra work, but the display appears optimized for each visitor. www.rodwatson.com

Generally, at www.HarbourLights.com , all the pages are set to appear acceptable at 640x480. To keep the text from displaying on lines way too long for someone with a high setting, I've used tables to control the display so it is about the same for all visitors.

Thanks for all of the replies. Now I have a lot to think about.

I'll let you know when I upload the new pages and ask for actually real life feedback at that point.

the dial up modems are at the whim of noise and traffic on the phone lines. From home, my 56k modem often connects at 33. Last night it connected one time at 31, once at 33, and once at 28. I agree with the above discussion that I'll wait if it seems worth the effort.

For example, I loaded Symantecs Systemworks last week. Now it takes forever for the computer to boot up when I turn it on. I notice that the hard drive is being accessed a lot more during the boot up than before. I'm assuming it's the antivirus stuff doing a check on the system, and that is certainly worth the extra wait. Same with lighthouse pictures that are intersting and of decent quality.