Re: Hard Disk sizes (was: New Member needs mass storage)

["Peter W. Borders" <TCBORDP@vbbusnw1.tc.cc.va.us>]

> I have a file that's 21375089 bytes.  If I want to tell someone how
> big that file is, do I say "21.4 MB," or do I grab a calculator and
> divide it by 1024 twice to get the correct answer, 20.4 MB?  People
> have been using MB=10^6 long before the hard disk manufacturers started.
> 
> For addressing reasons, RAM is generally limited to high powers of 2
> and simple combinations thereof.  Hard disks are not.
                                    ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
                                    
You know the sector sizes on all hy hard drives are 512 bytes, which 
seems to me to be a power of 2. Cluster sizes are even multiples of 
that which means they are also in powers of 2. Internally DOS and 
most other intel architecture operating systems use numbers, in 
powers of 2, to handle all disk accesses. Computers do EVERYTHING 
based on powers of two, that is where the idea of one "K" equaling 
1024 came from. Theoretically you could have a computer architecture 
based on powers of 10 but as far as I know none have ever been sold 
commercially.

Basically it resolves to the fact that anyone who works with 
computers for any length of time learns that one "K" is 1024 (2^10). 
You don't think that various commands that tell you disk space or 
file space used in "K" are talking 1000's do you? 

Pete