[MPlayer-users] Re: I wrote a mencoder mini-guide for DVD ripping

Michael Niedermayer michaelni at gmx.at
Sun Aug 25 10:54:02 CEST 2002


Hi

On Sunday 25 August 2002 03:22, D Richard Felker III wrote:
[...]
> On Sat, Aug 24, 2002 at 07:25:32PM +0300, Anssi Saari wrote:
> > [Automatic answer: RTFM (read DOCS, FAQ), also read DOCS/bugreports.html]
> >
> > On Sat, Aug 24, 2002 at 12:11:45PM +0200, Dominik Mierzejewski wrote:
> > > > 1KB = 1KibiByte = 1024 bytes
> > > > 1Kb = 1Kibibit = 1024 bits
> > >
> > > NO! Yuck. That was a bad idea from the beginning.
> >
> > Yes, it's disgusting. It's like some kind of a mouth exercise and without
> > a problem brings the term "gibbering idiot to mind...
> >
> > But the problem with "kB" is now that you don't know any more what it
> > means. In some software it's 1000B, like apt-get in Debian. In other
> > programs it's 1024B. So, as disgusting as KiB is, I prefer being
> > disgusting to being unclear.
>
> OK quick lesson.
>
> K with bytes should always mean 1024.
>
> K with bits has different meaning depending on context.
>
> K when dealing with storage/addressing units should always mean 1024.
> The idea is that it's idiotic to measure addressible storage units in
> anything but a power of two. And yes hard drive vendors are lying
> jerks.
>
> K when dealing with network bandwidth, flow rates, streams, etc.
> (non-addressed, non-storage data) probably means 1000. There's rarely
> if ever a reason to talk about such a thing in powers of two.

hmm, so i need ~0.9537mbit to store 1mbit which i downloaded
>
> Granted there is still a *little* ambiguity, but it's no big deal.
well its a big deal, IMHO any ambiguity is, as for example 1kb could mean 2 
things, its like feet vs. meters except that we use the same name for both 
(hint: feet & meters could be distinquished too, based upon the geographic 
location ...)

btw, how many bits per g does a 40Gb HD have which weighs 3.25Kg
with k=1000 its easy:      40Gb/3.25Kg= ~12.3077Gb/Kg = ~12.3077Mb/g
otherwise its not so easy: 40Gb/3.25Kg= ~12.3077Gb/Kg = ... sorry need to 
figure out if Gb is 1024 or 1000 based first ... hmm ok rich says 1024 for HD 
up there even though this isnt true for any HDs i ve seen but ok ...
~12.3077Gb/Kg = ~12603.1Mb/Kg = ~12.6031Mb/g

[...]
> Just my 2 cibents... (that's 1/128 dollar, not 1/100, lol!)
hmm, wouldnt that be cebi (kilo + binary -> kibi, cent + binary -> cebi)

btw, anyone knows, who is resposible for the kilo=1024 thing?, why didnt they 
choose another name, kilo allready had a clear meaning afaik

[...]

Michael




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