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Got my new Imac with payed for a 500 gb Hd and got a 465.44gb
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whocares said:
That's the right email adress if you are seeking for an occupation at Apple Computer Inc. but surely not the right one if you want to blame the CEO
500GB = 465GiB
There is nothing wrong with your Computer, it's just a conversion between different numerical bases. No way you can sue anyone, no way you get any money back. As said before GB is (officially) to base 10 and GiB is to base 2.
1 Giga (G) is 10^9 (10 in the power of nine) while one Gibi (Gi) is 2^30 (tow in the power of 30).
Like 1/4 Mile = 2/5 km - the same distance but different names and numbers. The only difference is that the names Giga (G) and Gibi (Gi) are way more similar.
There is an error in MacOS X though. They say your HD has 465GB which is wrong. It really has 500GB or 465GiB. So it should say 465GiB to be correct with the number.
Under different temperatures, the volume will change whether you pump petrolium in litres or gallons. In the UK we measure in litres too, but many still use gallons, we even measure in miles per gallon and litres per 100km. Since the liquid is pumped at approximately 15 degrees, you still are getting the same amount of fluid, whatever you measure in.ehurtley said:
And while we pay a lot more in the UK, (which is good in my mind, discourages greedy, selfish people from driving and polluting), isn't the US dollar a lot weaker now than in previous years? Hell, the beloved Euro is so much stronger these days, and that was dirided by US economists for so many years. So when you start talking about undervalued currencies, remember that the US dollar is still weakening, so suggesting people pay more because of a weaker currency is ill-informed to say the least, as it appears you were trying to.
I can imagine since these were in such small production, they would be expensive to use. Apple did a good job, but I bet it hit them on costs and it would have been in part at least passed on to the consumer.dornoforpyros said:
At the end of the day, computers deal with data in binary. It's the only language they truly understand. We deal with data in a regular, typing word documents way, this passes a series of programming commands through, which gets translated into machine code, which becomes binary, or 2^x. As explained, hard drives are measured in 10^x, where when x is each multiple of 3, it increases by 1000. In binary, this is each multiple of 10.
In order for a computer to process the information being passed to the memory, processor, graphics card, etc, it must be in binary. You could oversize the drives, (expensive manufacturing process more often than not), or quote in either binary or decimal. For tradition, it is quoted in decimal in bytes, not KB, MB or GB. So, they see how many bytes were manufactured and divide by 1000 for each multiple. The computer needs to work in binary, so the closest is indeed 1024. It seems like a con, but considering the alternatives, it's not that bad.
I advocate the usage of "500GB, (465.44GiB)" by manufacturers in the future.
This thread has somewhat drifted off. I like the direct comparison between 17" monitors and 500GB HDD. Also, if its in 1000's instead of 1024's then the normal user understands that they have 500GB based on 500 billion bytes where 1 billion bytes = 1GB. The same holds true, you purchased a 17" monitor and the casing is only as long as 1.2" so its still a 17" monitor in terms of size, but usability is only 15.8".
Take that into terms of HDD, if you had absolutely 500GB on a 500GB HDD, it wouldn't function because you write bits of data (0 and 1's : unraised and raised irrespecitvely). 8 bits = 1 byte, 1024 bytes = 1 kb, 1024 kb = 1mb, 1024 mb = 1gb, 1024gb = 1tb...etc.
If computers weren't in base 2, then computers wouldn't function. Microsoft's OS would crash as bad as Apple's OS due to parity errors and stuff like that. You write a 2 - 9 to any bit and the computer doesn't understand it. Any number between 2 and 9 is non-existant, it'd be like a survey. How do you rate this 0 - 9. Computers test true false : on off : set unset. So computers, using T/F methods, would read 2-9 as unknown, unknown, unknown, ... unknown - 1, unknown. Where only 1 and 0 would be recognized as an actual function - a certain key on or off.
--oh sorry, I mean if its raised or unraised, how do you rate 2-9 on a microscopic scale? We'd still have 500MB HDD due to the fact that it'd have to use more space to write 2-9 even thought those would cause parity errors.
---same with the flow of electricity: hmm since its flowing its 1, but its not as good as it should be so I give it a 5. Parity parity parity! YAY. Just kidding.
Take that into terms of HDD, if you had absolutely 500GB on a 500GB HDD, it wouldn't function because you write bits of data (0 and 1's : unraised and raised irrespecitvely). 8 bits = 1 byte, 1024 bytes = 1 kb, 1024 kb = 1mb, 1024 mb = 1gb, 1024gb = 1tb...etc.
If computers weren't in base 2, then computers wouldn't function. Microsoft's OS would crash as bad as Apple's OS due to parity errors and stuff like that. You write a 2 - 9 to any bit and the computer doesn't understand it. Any number between 2 and 9 is non-existant, it'd be like a survey. How do you rate this 0 - 9. Computers test true false : on off : set unset. So computers, using T/F methods, would read 2-9 as unknown, unknown, unknown, ... unknown - 1, unknown. Where only 1 and 0 would be recognized as an actual function - a certain key on or off.
--oh sorry, I mean if its raised or unraised, how do you rate 2-9 on a microscopic scale? We'd still have 500MB HDD due to the fact that it'd have to use more space to write 2-9 even thought those would cause parity errors.
---same with the flow of electricity: hmm since its flowing its 1, but its not as good as it should be so I give it a 5. Parity parity parity! YAY. Just kidding.
I just read through it again and it makes sense:
Base 2 for hard drives, to make marketing easier they base it off of 10s, but if it were actually based off of 10s you'd have 2-9 "survey" switches. By "survey" switches I mean how you take a survey and reate something 1-10. 0 is on 1 is off, but how do you rate 2? 3?
Electricity is another example, if its flowing, its a 1, if not, its a 0. What's 2? What's 3? and so on.
It compares how marketing, they put it in base 10 for hdd space instead of base 2 and how if it were base 10 instead of base 2, how bad it would mess up systems...wait wt heck does this have... I lost myself.... I dunno, it was... wow it was late huh? Darn you Slook, don't ever write things late at night.
Base 2 for hard drives, to make marketing easier they base it off of 10s, but if it were actually based off of 10s you'd have 2-9 "survey" switches. By "survey" switches I mean how you take a survey and reate something 1-10. 0 is on 1 is off, but how do you rate 2? 3?
Electricity is another example, if its flowing, its a 1, if not, its a 0. What's 2? What's 3? and so on.
It compares how marketing, they put it in base 10 for hdd space instead of base 2 and how if it were base 10 instead of base 2, how bad it would mess up systems...wait wt heck does this have... I lost myself.... I dunno, it was... wow it was late huh? Darn you Slook, don't ever write things late at night.
haha! that's funny! both of your posts are infected by the crazy logic! I won't even bother trying to interpret it, incase it infects me too, like a computer virus for the human brain!
Is it too crazy of an idea for hard drive makers to make drives that are 534.56 GB so the actual capacity would actually be 500 GiB?
zephead said:
Ok, we're talking about marketing: in other words: selling a product to a consumer who thinks its just the best, but in all actuality its missing some items to make it even worth while. Again in other words: smart marketing, stupid people
Not IBM, they're truthful honest.zephead said:Ah, so all the hard drive makers are following the Microsoft marketing model?
slooksterPSV said:
Uh, how many nights did you stay awake? I also wondered whether you were high or sleep-typing when sending the first post...
zephead said:
I'm not sure you can, it goes back to the way the disk is formatted. If I'm correct, it's like cutting a pie in (angular) slices, but also in concentric circles, so you end up with sectors at the intersections which look like slightly distorted rectangles.
From there, you can only increase the number of angular slices / concentric lines, so that the number of sectors increases by steps, and not one by one.
Conclusion: the number of Gb/GiB is kinda fixed by the construction options.
If anyone can confirm that...
Dell used to be a lot better about this sort of thing - I was also amazed to find a FAT (not even FAT32) partition on their Core Duo laptop. Though it seems they've been doing this for a while - I just haven't owned a Dell since 1997.topgunn said:
To the original poster: I know it seems a little odd if you're not familiar with how HDD space is advertised and actually used, but don't sweat the small stuff, just have fun. I've got a 400GB HDD on my iMac, and I don't think in more than a year I've managed to fill even 50% - and that's with a *lot* of apps, sound and video files.
I have a HUGE feeling there is going to be a class action lawsuit one day involving false advertisment and hard drives, ram, cd-r, dvd-r, etc.
paperinacup said:
Yeah, sure - the same day they'll sue Toys'R'Us for letting kids believe in Santa Claus
Honestly, the "worst" that could happen to the manufacturers is a law pushed by consumers' unions for the introduction of GiB or whatever, but a class action lawsuit...
Already been tried and failed. It clearly says something like "actual formatted capacity may be less". Sucks, but whatever, it's not that big of a deal. You'd still be buying a 465GB hdd.paperinacup said:
Arnaud said:
heh that's an awesome analogy... took me a bit to get what you were saying but works perfectly. And yea I feel like that's right... they can't just make hard drives whatever size they want to.