why only 18 gigs?
[202 byte] By [playdeep] at [2007-11-9 16:17:27] 
hey guys...i have a 2nd gen 20 gig ipod. but in the settings...it always says i have 5.2 gigs of 18.55 used. if it is a 20 gig why is it out of 18.55 gigs? thanks...i figure this is a simple question...
# 1 Re: why only 18 gigs?
Because humans think in base 10 and computers think in base two. A kilobyte is actually 1024 bytes, not 1000 bytes, so your 20gb hard drive only has the capacity of 20,000,000,000/1024/1024/1024=18.626GB, and some of that is taken up by the firmware.Take a look at any of your other hard drives on you computer and you will find that this happens with all of them. I just bought a new 160gb hard drive and only had 149gb of storage to put my data on. BTW This is ####ing some people off so much that they have decided to sue the manufacturers.
Hope this helps,
Bill McNair
SouthsideIrish at 2007-11-15 17:03:38 >
# 2 Re: why only 18 gigs?
It has been traditional in the PC disc market to measure Kilo/mega/giga bytes using base ten although the IEEE and others use a standard of little "k" for kilo meaning 1000, and big "K" for kilo meaning 1024.Also "b" means bit and "B" means byte)
I worked for Sperry Univac in the seventies (now Unisys) and they always used decimal-based numbers for RAM too. So they sold not 128 KiloBytes but 132 kiloBytes modules for memory.
Norman at 2007-11-15 17:04:38 >
# 3 Re: why only 18 gigs?
It's a misleading marketing strategy.Deaddy at 2007-11-15 17:05:47 >
# 4 Re: why only 18 gigs?
What "misleading market strategy"? It has always been this way, and probably always will be this way. There is no marketing strategy to it at all.Bill McNair
SouthsideIrish at 2007-11-15 17:06:48 >
# 5 Re: why only 18 gigs?
Most people who don't know about computers would assume its a full 20 gigs as they would appear on your computer and not expect to end up with 18. Selling a 20gig hard drive is more appealing to people than an 18 gig. That's what I mean. I find that misleading.Deaddy at 2007-11-15 17:07:47 >
# 6 Re: why only 18 gigs?
Even Dell advertises drives that way, and people don't seem to care when they buy from them. Anyone who buys a computer is usually familiar with this.
DarkJC at 2007-11-15 17:08:46 >
# 7 Re: why only 18 gigs?
well guys......i am sorry that i was ignorant to this.playdeep at 2007-11-15 17:09:50 >
[an error occurred while processing this directive]