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In this convention, one thousand and twenty-four megabytes (1024 MB) is equal to one gigabyte (1 GB), where 1 GB is 1024 3 bytes (i.e., 1 GiB). Mixed 1 MB = 1 024 000 bytes (= 1000×1024 B) is the definition used to describe the formatted capacity of the 1.44 MB 3.5-inch HD floppy disk , which actually has a capacity of 1 474 560 bytes .
By convention, file size units use either a metric prefix (as in megabyte and gigabyte) or a binary prefix (as in mebibyte and gibibyte). [1] When a file is written to a file system, which is the case in most modern devices, it may consume slightly more disk space than the file requires.
With the advent of gigabyte-range drive capacities, manufacturers labelled many consumer hard drive, solid-state drive and USB flash drive capacities in certain size classes expressed in decimal gigabytes, such as "500 GB". The exact capacity of a given drive model is usually slightly larger than the class designation.
The byte is a common unit of measurement of information (kilobyte, kibibyte, megabyte, mebibyte, gigabyte, gibibyte, terabyte, tebibyte, etc.). For the purpose of this article, a byte is a group of 8 bits ( octet ), a nibble is a group of four bits.
These prefixes are more often used for multiples of bytes, as in kilobyte (1 kB = 8000 bit), megabyte (1 MB = 8 000 000 bit), and gigabyte (1 GB = 8 000 000 000 bit). However, for technical reasons, the capacities of computer memories and some storage units are often multiples of some large power of two, such as 2 28 = 268 435 456 bytes.
On the other hand, a hard disk whose capacity is specified by the manufacturer as "10 gigabytes" or "10 GB", holds 10 × 10 9 = 10 000 000 000 bytes, or a little more than that, but less than 10 × 2 30 = 10 737 418 240 and a file whose size is listed as "2.3 GB" may have a size closer to 2.3 × 2 30 ≈ 2 470 000 000 or to 2.3 × 10 9 = 2 300 ...
An alternative system of nomenclature for the same units (referred to here as the customary convention), in which 1 kilobyte (KB) is equal to 1,024 bytes, [38] [39] [40] 1 megabyte (MB) is equal to 1024 2 bytes and 1 gigabyte (GB) is equal to 1024 3 bytes is mentioned by a 1990s JEDEC standard. Only the first three multiples (up to GB) are ...
For example, in citations of main memory or RAM capacity, kilobyte, megabyte and gigabyte customarily mean 1024 (2 10), 1 048 576 (2 20) and 1 073 741 824 (2 30) bytes respectively. In the specifications of hard disk drive capacities and network transmission bit rates, decimal prefixes are used. For example, a 500-gigabyte hard drive holds 500 ...