HDD's - the Advertized size vs the Actual size.

[Antman]

...But still it's a rip off by the manufacturers because every thing else in the computer world is using the Kilo, Giga and Terra.

1 Gbyte of memory = 1 Gbyte of memory.

1 Gbyte of diskspace = 0.9313226 Gbyte of diskspace

So it is very convenient for them to make this exception in their favor.

If I am not mistaken, many HDDs actually have more capacity on the platters than is actually used. I do not know the technology, but I do recall reading something akin to that while I was researching BER and RAID5.

 

[fseal]

They are getting away with something there that's for sure.

Monitor companies were similarly taken to task over tube sizes back in the day (Max tube diagonal reported vs actual screen size assumed). It would be nice if you could buy a "500 gig" drive and actually see "500 gigs" on your computer!

 

[Geralt]

Aha! I was always wondering why I only had 465GB instead of the 500GB.

Thanks for the detailed explanation! +Rep.

 

[Hexmaniac]

C'mon guys, no one is 'getting away' with anything. Computers just represent numbers differently than we do. It 'counts' in binary.

1 Kilobyte = 2^10 = 1024 decimal
1 Megabyte = 2^20 = 1048576 decimal
1 Gigabyte = 2^30 = 1073741824 decimal.

A '500 GIG drive' has 500 billion locations. Count them. Divide it by 2^30 and you get 465.66. It's still 500 billion. You aren't losing storage locations.

If it still bothers you...at least you're getting over on the RAM people. I just bought 12 GB of RAM from OCZ...well they said it was 12 GB...but I'll be damned if my system didn't say I had 12,884,901,888 of RAM. Almost a whole extra GB for FREE!

Just the way it is.

 

[Zidane24]

C'mon guys, no one is 'getting away' with anything. Computers just represent numbers differently than we do. It 'counts' in binary.

1 Kilobyte = 2^10 = 1024 decimal
1 Megabyte = 2^20 = 1048576 decimal
1 Gigabyte = 2^30 = 1073741824 decimal.

A '500 GIG drive' has 500 billion locations. Count them. Divide it by 2^30 and you get 465.66. It's still 500 billion. You aren't losing storage locations.

If it still bothers you...at least you're getting over on the RAM people. I just bought 12 GB of RAM from OCZ...well they said it was 12 GB...but I'll be damned if my system didn't say I had 12,884,901,888 of RAM. Almost a whole extra GB for FREE!

Just the way it is.

Re-read the thread...your missing the point, a vaild one at that

 

[Luckystar]

So thats why my so called 750gb reads 698gb.

That must be one of the worst buys ever.

Thanks for the advise

Tip o the scales for you

 

[zigzag3143]

It gets better HD's can have up to 10% bad sectors.

 

[Hexmaniac]

C'mon guys, no one is 'getting away' with anything. Computers just represent numbers differently than we do. It 'counts' in binary.

1 Kilobyte = 2^10 = 1024 decimal
1 Megabyte = 2^20 = 1048576 decimal
1 Gigabyte = 2^30 = 1073741824 decimal.

A '500 GIG drive' has 500 billion locations. Count them. Divide it by 2^30 and you get 465.66. It's still 500 billion. You aren't losing storage locations.

If it still bothers you...at least you're getting over on the RAM people. I just bought 12 GB of RAM from OCZ...well they said it was 12 GB...but I'll be damned if my system didn't say I had 12,884,901,888 of RAM. Almost a whole extra GB for FREE!

Just the way it is.

Re-read the thread...your missing the point, a vaild one at that

Actually, I was addressing the two posts directly above mine, not the content of the thread. I am just stating that the prefix of giga- represents 10^9 (1,000,000,000), in which case drive manufacturers are correct in identifying their drive's capacity. A PC represents giga- as 2^30. There is no numerical difference. That's all...

 

[fseal]

The manufacturers are correct but it is still misleading. If you polled 100 normal computer users, only a small handful would know why their 500gig drive they bought only shows 486 gig on their computer.

It's an "advertising lie" and it's the best kind, its "technically correct" but it /is/ misleading and confusing. NOONE uses the base 10 representation of a "Gig" on a computer, and that is where the drive size is reported.

You bring up memory, that's a great example. Why is storage in ram reported differently from stoarge on permament media. They are both storage, both storing the same thing and both addressed and size reported in base 2 representaions of a "Gigabyte" (Yes technically a Gibibyte)). Yet for some confusing and inexplicable reason they use two different representations of the word "Gigabyte".

 

[SquonkSC]

So thats why my so called 750gb reads 698gb.

That must be one of the worst buys ever.

Thanks for the advise

Tip o the scales for you

I guess this guy tipped someone else's scale, because I didn't get it.

What am I going to tell my postpimp?

 

[thefabe]

All very interesting and informative amy way you look at it . Nice post thaks

 

[jimbo45]

Hi all
Like most of this stuff there's some truth and some mis-information in this thread.
The main sin is the sin of OMISSION (file system overhead).

The actual capacity depends on all sorts of factors most notably the FILE SYSTEM you are using.

When you format the device initially with say NTFS there's default cluster sizes - and this is not necessarily the optimum for the disk you actually have.

Using say a Linux or Unix type system with say ext3 as a file system you will certainly get a better use out of the drive as the whole file system manages directories and data areas much better than NTFS.

Even a 2 byte file in NTFS will occupy 4 - 64K depending on the options used to format the disk initially.

The 1TB / 500GB specification refers to the maximum UNFORMATTED size of the disk. Note in this context 1KB is actually 1024 bytes.

Formatting a disk (i.e installing a file system on it) will reduce the useable size of the disk by the amount of "overhead" in the file system - such as space for directory entries, link entries when a file expands ("aditional extents" as the jargon says) etc etc.

To get the best space use on an NTFS disk just google as there's Zillions of topics on "cluster size" etc etc.

Cheers
jimbo

 

[SquonkSC]

Hi all
Like most of this stuff there's some truth and some mis-information in this thread.
The main sin is the sin of OMISSION.

The actual capacity depends on all sorts of factors most notably the FILE SYSTEM you are using.

When you format the device initially with say NTFS there's default cluster sizes - and this is not necessarily the optimum for the disk you actually have.

Using say a Linux or Unix type system with say ext3 as a file system you will certainly get a better use out of the drive as the whole file system manages directories and data areas much better than NTFS.

Even a 2 byte file in NTFS will occupy 4 - 64K depending on the options used to format the disk initially.

The 1TB / 500GB specification refers to the maximum UNFORMATTED size of the disk. Note in this context 1KB is actually 1024 bytes.

Formatting a disk (i.e installing a file system on it) will reduce the useable size of the disk by the amount of "overhead" in the file system - such as space for directory entries, link entries when a file expands ("aditional extents" as the jargon says) etc etc.

To get the best space use on an NTFS disk just google as there's Zillions of topics on "cluster size" etc etc.

Cheers
jimbo

Although the info you provide is partly true,
your information has nothing to do with the point of the thread.

1. Unformatted or Formatted changes nothing to the physical amount,
nor does the filesystem.

2. That one file system occupies (steals) more space than others is true,
but that has nothing to do with the fact that 500gigabyte = 465gigibyte


We all know that a kilo stands for 1000,
but in every aspect of computing we all (miss)use Kilo for 1024,
where we should use Kibi.

But we do this consistently.

When you buy RAM that is advertised as 1Terabyte you get in fact
1Tebibyte = 1099.511.627.776 byte

When you buy a HDD that is advertised as 1Terabyte you get in fact 1Terabyte = 1000.000.000.000 byte.

Although the disk manufacturer is absolutely right, they clearly use this common misconception to their advantage.

And no matter how you format that disk or what OS you put on it,
it will always remain 1000.000.000.000 byte.

greetz

 

[H2SO4]

Using say a Linux or Unix type system with say ext3 as a file system you will certainly get a better use out of the drive as the whole file system manages directories and data areas much better than NTFS.

Really? How exactly?

Even a 2 byte file in NTFS will occupy 4 - 64K depending on the options used to format the disk initially.

No. The contents of a small file are physically stored within that file's MFT record. In other words, it does not consume an entire cluster for its "2 bytes".

The 1TB / 500GB specification refers to the maximum UNFORMATTED size of the disk. Note in this context 1KB is actually 1024 bytes.

No. The point of squonksc's excellent post is to explain that, where HDDs and similar storage media are concerned, "1KB" is actually 1,000 bytes - it's a real KiloByte in the SI sense of that prefix, and not a KibiByte (a binary "kilo").

 

[SquonkSC]

Even a 2 byte file in NTFS will occupy 4 - 64K depending on the options used to format the disk initially.

No. The contents of a small file are physically stored within that file's MFT record. In other words, it does not consume an entire cluster for its "2 bytes".

That would be one of the main advantages of NTFS vs Fat32?

Where the cluster size would heavily influence the amount of slack?

The advantage being undone, by the huge amount of reserved space for MFT.

 

[Znuff]

The 1024/1000 is actually not related to the manufacturers "getting away with it". It's a simple thing.

We (old time computer users, programmers etc.) normally think of Kilo, Mega etc. prefixes to mean 1024x. While this has been the accepted when computers were used only by technical people, and we knew that 1 KiloByte = 1024 bytes. BUT for most people KILO means 1000, unconditionally. Think of KiloMeter, KiloGram etc.

So, to piece it all together, in the International System of Units (SI) [ie: the stuff that US and UK guys don't use] a KILObyte equals 1000 Bytes, 1 MEGAbyte equals 1000 KILObytes and so on. While, in the same SI 1 KibiByte = 1024 Bytes, 1MibiByte = 1024 KibiBytes and so on.

Manufacturers just measure in the International System of Units, while our computer OS-es (Windows, especially) measure our datas with the normal binary measures (KibiBytes, MibiBytes etc.) while incorectly using the names of the measures and their short forms (KB instead of KiB, MB instead of MiB, GB instead of GiB).


Hope I didn't confuse anyone.

 

[SquonkSC]

The 1024/1000 is actually not related to the manufacturers "getting away with it". It's a simple thing.

We (old time computer users, programmers etc.) normally think of Kilo, Mega etc. prefixes to mean 1024x. While this has been the accepted when computers were used only by technical people, and we knew that 1 KiloByte = 1024 bytes. BUT for most people KILO means 1000, unconditionally. Think of KiloMeter, KiloGram etc.

So, to piece it all together, in the International System of Units (SI) [ie: the stuff that US and UK guys don't use] a KILObyte equals 1000 Bytes, 1 MEGAbyte equals 1000 KILObytes and so on. While, in the same SI 1 KibiByte = 1024 Bytes, 1MibiByte = 1024 KibiBytes and so on.

Manufacturers just measure in the International System of Units, while our computer OS-es (Windows, especially) measure our datas with the normal binary measures (KibiBytes, MibiBytes etc.) while incorectly using the names of the measures and their short forms (KB instead of KiB, MB instead of MiB, GB instead of GiB).


Hope I didn't confuse anyone.

Though true, your post adds nothing to all that's been said before.

The disk manufacturers are the only ones that use the kilo as it should.
Nobody else in the industry does.
How convenient for them.

The point of the thread is to explain why an advertised 500gb is 465gb on the computer.
That's what I did.

Greetz

 

[Znuff]

Actually, more than 50% of the population uses kilo as it should be. Go ask 10 random on the street how many BYTES is a KILO BYTE and at least 5 of them will tell you 1000

Also, the same applies to CD/DVD/BluRay/HD-DVD etc. mediums

 

[SquonkSC]

Actually, more than 50% of the population uses kilo as it should be. Go ask 10 random on the street how many BYTES is a KILO BYTE and at least 5 of them will tell you 1000

Also, the same applies to CD/DVD/BluRay/HD-DVD etc. mediums

I was talking about everybody in the industry, not random noobs on the street.
Show me one technician that calls 1024 bytes a kibibyte?
It was suggested by some in the industry to use kibibyte, but it didn't happen.
And except for storage manufacturers, every one else in the industry still uses kilobyte to express 1024 bytes.

And though the noobs might say a kilo is 1000,
when they find out their 500gb disk only contains 465gb they are surprised.

Once again, and for the last time, that is the whole point of the thread.
Telling me the hdd manufacturers are actually right, again and again is pointless, cause I know.

I bet you that if they were to pay their taxes per sold kilobyte,
they would say their 500gb disk is actually 465gb. Get my point?

 

[jimbo45]

Actually the File system is important -- How do you know that the disk is actually less than 500 GB. Presumably you must have put some data on it or formatted it in some way. All file systems have directory overhead etc which reduce the amount of available DATA space on the disk.

What is Windows telling you in any case -- the physical data size of the disk or what Windows actually sees and can use.

Looking at the packaging of one of my older powered 500 GB USB ext drives I see that the spec refers to 500 GB Unformatted capacity and mentions that the actual amount may be less after formatting it.

The "Native" amount of the disk before you format it can probably be seen in your BIOS before the system boots into the OS.

The measurement here should refect the theoretical maximum capacity of the disk drive (it should show you details such as Sectors / heads / cylinders etc).

Cheers
jimbo