GiB vs. GB

[Thiago Macieira]

Stefanos Harhalakis wrote:
>  The problem with that is that we're used to use different meanings of
> KB. For example, 2GB of memory are 2048MBs, but 100Mbps of NIC speed is
> 100000Kbps. So, a single option is doomed to result in bug reports :-)
> (Imagine a program saying that your 100Mbps ethernet connection is just
> 95.36Mbps)

It's more complicated than that and we can thank the telecommunications 
industry for it.

A 64 kbit/s phone line is actually 64000 bits per second (one packet of 8 
bits at 8000 times per second). However, when you put 32 of them 
together, you get 2048000 bits per second or 2 Mbit/s (exact).

Then again, there's a lot of overhead in any transmission protocol, so 
anyone trying to make exact calculations is nuts.

-- 
  Thiago Macieira  -  thiago (AT) macieira.info - thiago (AT) kde.org
    PGP/GPG: 0x6EF45358; fingerprint:
    E067 918B B660 DBD1 105C  966C 33F5 F005 6EF4 5358
-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: signature.asc
Type: application/pgp-signature
Size: 189 bytes
Desc: This is a digitally signed message part.
URL: <https://mail.kde.org/mailman/private/kfm-devel/attachments/20071103/ee28b4cc/attachment.sig>