Bandwidth Explained, in Electronics and Computing; Also Compared to Throughput

Bandwidth Explained
The term bandwidth can be confusing sometimes as it could have different meanings if used in electronics or in computing. This unclarity increases as it is confused with speed or throughput in computing. In this short article, I will try to lay it down and simplify its meaning along with other terms.
In electronics, bandwidth is used to define the channel width, or in other words the range of frequencies at which a system operates. One example is the AM radio station, where the bandwidth is defined as 9 or 10KHz (depending on the region). Wi-Fi systems is another example. It has a bandwidth of 22MHz in the 2.4 GHz (802.11b/g/n/ax) defined band.
The bandwidth in electronics does not define the data transmission rate. Although a wider bandwidth can allow for more data transmission, the speed of transmission is further defined by many other factors like modulation, coding, compression, etc...
The bandwidth term we mostly talk about in everyday life, as known to many, is related to the data transmission rate. In computing, bandwidth is the maximum amount of data that can be transmitted over a connection, or through a system. It is measured in bits per second (bps). A Category 6a cable, for instance, has a bandwidth of 10Gbps. This is the maximum speed supported by this cable. When you use this cable within a system, and even though all the system components are rated at 10Gbps, the speed or throughput of the system will mostly fall short of the 10Gbps performance.
Another example is your home internet connection. You may have a subscription of 50 Mbps bandwidth; this is the maximum speed you could get. But when you do a speed test for your internet connection, you will find out that you are not getting the 50Mbps. Latency is one of the causes of lower internet throughputs. It is the time it takes a data packet to go from the source to destination. This could be caused by many reasons like:
• The number of nods the signal is going through before reaching you
• How congested these nods are
• The distance from your system to the information you are trying to access
• The Bit error rate in the communication channel
Delays can be also be caused by bottlenecks and congestion in the system.
On another hand, the throughput (also referred to as speed) is a real measurement of a system or channel performance. “A network throughput is the rate of successful message delivery over a communication channel.” It is also measured in bits per second. Knowing the bandwidth and throughput of a system can give an indication on how efficient it is operating.
To conclude, bandwidth is a scientific number representing the range of frequency in electronics. But in computing, it is a theoretical value of the maximum bits per second a computing system can transmit, receive, or process. While the throughput indicates the actual performance of a computing system.