Image Load of a Site?

[jream]

I know the images on a site are crucial to the user,
most people SEEM to be on cable/dsl now-a-days..

so for those who arent, and even those who are..

Whats the maximum you should really make your site
as far as images all together? Load time under 5 secs
for 56k im assuming?

[Brandon]

Any site loading on a 56k modem that takes 5 seconds must be a very sinmple site with almost no images. I think, from my experiences, that the average load time is 10-20 seconds on 56k. On dsl I think it would be 2-4 seconds. On cable probably 2-3 or a little lower as well. But with webmaster sites, all webmasetrs like have to have cable or dsl, so its pretty safe to use lots of images.

[Yowser]

I generally work to keep it under 8 seconds for modem users except if there is reason to believe that most visitors wouldn't be on a modem.

I would agree that 5 seconds would be difficult for most sites.

[mikedavis]

sadly most people still are definately not on broadband although sometime soon I'm sure the barrier will cross 50%

[BestCoder]

Well i'm not worrying, because i have a webmaster site, and i would think over 95% or webmasetrs have a connection better than a modem.

[Brandon]

Yea i do think most people who are online alot have cable or dsl, so I dont worry much. Especcially with a site like dn lodge, a webmaster site, because all webmaster have a fast connection.

[jaswinder_rana]

but people in many contries are still using modem as they just starting into internet world. it depends who your audience is. if you think you can do without those people (like BestCoder), you can get away with this.

but if you are making for all the people then its a matter of consideration.

and remember you can always use the compression techniques to compress your page. it reduces time by big amount.

for eg in PHP you can do this

ob_start('ob_gzhandler');

and i am using it myself and for a page that used to load in 5 seconds not loads in3.50-4.50 seconds. it doesn't look much but its still an improvement

[DotOrgGuy]

I try to keep my load times down. When building sites for non-profit orgs, you can't be sure that the visitors are going to have a faster connection.

I could understand not caring as much if your visitors are web developers or kids into gaming.