[MacDV] Re: Lost in Japan

[Mark M. Florida]

On 3/17/04 11:30 AM, Steven Rogers at srogers1 at austin.rr.com wrote:

> 
> On Mar 17, 2004, at 11:12 AM, Mark M. Florida wrote:
> 
>> (yes, 4.4 GB [binary] and *NOT* 4.7 GB [base 10])
> 
> ??

Ever notice that your 120 GB HD is not actually 120 GB, but more like 115
GB?  That's because the drive manufacturers like to make the drive seem as
big as possible, so they measure the capacity in base-10 (1,000 KB = 1 MB,
1,000 MB = 1 GB, etc.), rather than binary (1,024 KB = 1 MB, 1,024 MB = 1
GB, etc.).  Since your computer stores binary data, the ACTUAL storage
capacity in binary terms is much different that what's advertised since the
drive manus use base-10.  Why they do this, I don't know -- it really
undermines the usefulness of capacity measurements.  You buy a 4.7 GB DVD-R,
but you can only put 4.4 GB of data on it.  Why?  Binary vs. Base-10.  Ugh.

- Mark