How to sort out this Mb - MB nonsense

[aeroripper]

okay i am preloading hl2 and it says "1.5Mb" and a second

now i know they are referring to "megabits" not megabytes

so how fast is that really going cause i know my download speed is capped at 360k/sec (cable connection)

So would that be around 150k a second or soemthing?

 

[Mr-Fusion]

Divide by 8.

1500/8=187kbytes

 

[aeroripper]

why divide by 8?

1 byte = 8 bits?

OH... so 1500 bytes (1000 = a Mb) uh

wait
no i'm confused again

 

[T.H.C.138]

I think it is actually 1500kbits/sec..thats what I signed up for (dsl)..

 

[aeroripper]

Well i think my download cap is at 360k/sec cause that's as fast as i ever get downloading stuff off the internet.....

(even using getright and getting more mirrors when the d/l speed would normally go over 360 but it always stays there at its max)

 

[aerasal]

yes, 8 bits is a byte. 1500 kilobits = 1.5 megabit

 

[aeroripper]

Okay so i checked on my interent speeds again and it says the max download is capped at 2000Mb\sec

So what would this be in Kb?

250Kb/sec? Then how can i download sometimes at 360Kb/sec?

 

[Mr-Fusion]

Internet speeds are always measured in BITS. It's a marketing thing because 1500kbits sounds larger than 187kbytes. But when downloading files it's measured in BYTES because bytes sounds smaller. 187megabyte file sounds smaller than a 1500megabit file.

 

[aeroripper]

i see... very clever Mr. Fusion

 

[anasiz]

If you write Mb it's megabits. MB is for megabyte.

So 2000 Mb/s is 2 Gb/s, wich you surely don't have You must have 2.0 Mb/s, wich is (2/8) = 0.25 MB/s = 250 KB/s (forgetting that 1 megabyte is really 1024 kilobytes, but anyway...). So you can't go faster than 250 kilobytes per second, or 2000 megabits per second.

 

[aeroripper]

But i have... 360 kilobytes per second.... unless it was kilobits.. but then if it was 360 kilobits it would only be like what... umm... 45 kilobytes a second?

EDIT: OH, so maybe the 360KB is from the 1024\8 or whatever

 

[aerasal]

downloading at 250KB/sec is pretty fast

 

[graydon20]

Sometimes on a good server i can get 630 kb/sec, and that's just the normal residential cable package. The benefits of being Canadian sometimes .

 

[dys4iK]

I think the trend is slowly moving in favour of measuring in practical terms, so kilobytes and megabytes instead of kilobits and megabits, simply because it's really confusing otherwise.

About time.

 

[Sunlight]

It takes 8 (proper) binary digits to equal one character (one character = one byte), and each binary number, is a bit.

 

[tank]

i have 1500-3000 Mb DSL connection here at home...
1500/8 = 187.5 KB/s
3000/8 = 375 KB/s

that means my bandwidth is between 187.5 KB/s and 375 KB/s (downstream)

my upstream is 384Kb... that means i upload at 48 KB per second

when i download somthing i usually get 330 KB/s
I can download 1 MByte in 3 seconds...

Tank

 

[Jackal hit]

wait wait wait

1024 Bytes is one kB; 8 bits per byte... so...

1024 kB = 8192 kb = 1 MB

 

[Reiska]

I think the trend is slowly moving in favour of measuring in practical terms, so kilobytes and megabytes instead of kilobits and megabits, simply because it's really confusing otherwise.

About time.

I dont think so. It is easier to market "8Mbit/s ADSL" than to market "1MB/s ADSL" when your competitors are of course still using bit/s. Consumers would go for "faster looking" and you dont want your salesmen to waste all day at explaining differences to to-be-customers.

In telecommunications, bandwidth has always been measured by bits per second(bit/s or bps). Look at 14.4k/56k modems, 64k/128k isdn, 10M/100M ethernet, gigabit ethernet and so on.

And for that being confusing, give me a break. Were not talking about rocket science here. Its not more difficult than converting, say, miles per hour to kilometers per hour. Its actually much easier, just divide or multiply with 8 (basically).

(partially off-topic)
IMO, Prefixes for binary multiples bring much more confusion into this field, than dealing with bytes and bits. Have a look.
http://physics.nist.gov/cuu/Units/binary.html

Lets not go there, here.

 

[Aceallways]

this is soooooooooo sad

 

[aeroripper]

i feel so stupid right now

my masters in computer science.... WASTED!!! !

 

[Brian Damage]

>>

<<

Half A Byte Is A Nybble...

 

[ahardy668]

>>

<<

Half A Byte Is A Nybble...

When I was in school and first heard that I thought my teacher was joking.

 

[DeltaBlast]

Let's use this thread to gloat over other's speeds! ^_^

I have 4096 down and 1024 up (512/128).. muhahaaha! ^_^

 

[Bobcat]

1.5 Megabits a second equals 192 Kilobytes a second.

Theoretically.