Capacity Planning
Capacity Planning |
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When a browser makes a Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) request for a page, a delay occurs while the server encrypts the page. When the server sends the page, SSL adds additional network overhead. To enhance security, SSL also disables proxy and browser caching, so the considerable performance gains these allow are lost. The transaction time with SSL can be as much as a full order of magnitude longer. Finally, once the browser has received the requested files, the user must wait while they are decrypted, causing the download time to be even longer.
For these reasons, you should use SSL only when it is really necessary, such as when you need to ensure the security of financial transactions. Also, you should use it only on the specific pages to which it applies, rather than on an entire site.