@patio11: Actually, you can save bandwidth at the sub-packet level. Ethernet is a common link layer protocol that we can examine: It has a variable length frame

@patio11: Actually, you can save bandwidth at the sub-packet level. Ethernet is a common link layer protocol that we can examine: It has a variable length frame, and because it uses time-delimited bit-level framing, the smaller your ethernet frame the quicker it can be sent. The only real caveat to axod's article is that you often can't save on performance of intermediary systems (routers) because they tend to pre-allocate blocks of memory for packets, so no memory is saved when some packets are smaller. But your ISP doesn't meter you at the link layer anyway (or often even the IP level), so the savings as reported by the article are absolutely real in terms of bandwidth costs. (as in money)