The units of measurement accompany us every day, depending on whether we want to measure distances, weights, quantities, etc. Like is logic, computing has its own units standardized and recognized measurements. But within computing there are different units of measurement, such as the size of a file or the speed of data transfer, for example. But in this post we are going to focus on the gigabyte (GB).
First we must go to the most basic unit of measure in computing: bit (b). The bit in binary language is the expression of a value '0' or a value '1'. Within computing we only have these two states. Byte (B) is a set of 8 bits. Now we only have to scale and see the equivalences, something that we will see in this post.
Table of Contents
What is a Gigabyte?
We define a gigabyte as a storage unit whose symbol is the GB which is equivalent to 1.000.000.000 (109) of bytes. Not to be confused with the gibibyte (230) established in the regulations IEC 60027-2 y IEC 80000-13: 2008 of the International Electrotechnical Commission, whose symbol is: GiB
- The gigabyte has an equivalent of 1.000MB (megabytes)
- The gibibyte has an equivalence of 1.024MiB (mibibytes)
The GB unit of measure is commonly used for the storage capacity of a device or the size of files. More and more units pass the Terabyte, which has a 1.000GB equivalent.
What is the difference between Gigabyte and Gibibyte?
The International Electrotechnical Commission (IEC) in 1998 defined the binary prefixes, setting Gigabyte to denote 10003 and gibigyte denote 10243 Bytes. This IEC standard was adopted in 2007 by the IEEE, the EU and NIST, and in 2009 the International System of Quantities (SI) was added. Despite all gigabyte is still used as a standard term for the two types of quantities.
Base 10 (decimal)
1GB = 1 bytes (= 000 3 B = 10 9 B)
Use of the prefix 'giga-' in powers of base 10 defined by the SI and is the definition recommended by the IEC. This nomenclature is used in networking contexts and in data storage systems, especially on hard drives, flash drives and optical media.
Base 2 (binary)
1 GiB = 1 073 741 824 bytes (= 1024 3 B = 2 30 B)
For this context, base 2 is used, on which the architectural principle of binary computers is based. This is defined as a gibigyte.
Nota: In current operating systems this differentiation is not implemented and can generate interpretation problems as we will see later.
[irp]How many megabytes are in a gigabyte?
The Megabyte (MB) has become practically the smallest unit of measurement for almost most uses. The photographs of our smartphone usually occupy several Megabytes, that is why it is so important to know the relationship between Megabyte and Gigabyte. Basically the Gigabyte is the unit of size and / or capacity directly superior to the Megabyte.
As we have seen, storage units and / or size have two ways of expressing themselves. On the one hand we have the decimal base (base 10) and the binary base (base 2). So we must make an interpretation for these two bases on the equivalence of capabilities.
The relationship is as follows:
- 1000 Megabyte (MB) = 1 Gigabyte (GB)
- 1024 Mebibyte (MiB) = 1 Gibibyte (GiB)
- 953.674 Mebibyte (MiB) = 1 Gigabyte (GB)
How many gigabytes are in a terabyte?
Modern hard drives have capacities measured in Terabyte (TB). We can find 1TB or 2TB solid state hard drives or mechanical hard drives up to 10TB or more on the market. As with the rest of measurement units, there is an error when defining it.
As with the rest of storage units and / or size, can be expressed in two different ways. We must distinguish the decimal base (base 10) and the binary base (base 2). These equivalences would be as follows and see how many Gigabytes there are within a Terabyte according to the base:
- 1000 Gigabyte (GB) = 1 Terabyte (TB)
- 1024 Gibibyte (GiB) = 1 Tebibyte (TiB)
- 931.323 Gibibyte (GiB) = 1 Terabyte (TB)
Storage relationship and symbols
Denomination, symbol and size
| Size | Symbol | Equivalence | Size in bytes |
| Bit | b | - | - |
| Byte | B | 8 bits | 1 bytes |
| kilobyte | kB | 1 bytes | 1 bytes |
| megabyte | MB | 1KB | 1 bytes |
| Gigabyte | GB | 1 024 MB | 1 bytes |
| Terabytes | TB | 1 024 GB | 1 bytes |
| Petabytes | PB | 1 TB | 1 125 899 906 842 624 byte |
| Exabyte | EB | 1 bps | 1 152 921 504 606 846 976 byte |
| zettabyte | ZB | 1 GB | 1 180 591 620 717 411 303 424 byte |
| yottabyte | YB | ZB1 | 1 208 925 819 614 629 174 706 176 byte |
Comparison between decimal and binary base
| Name (Symbol) | International unity | Name (Symbol) | Binary unit (ISO / IEC 80000-13: 2008) |
| Kilobytes (KB) | 103 | kibibyte (KiB) | 210 |
| Megabytes (MB) | 106 | Mebibyte (MiB) | 220 |
| Gigabytes (GB) | 109 | Gibibyte (GiB) | 230 |
| Terabytes (TB) | 1012 | Tebibyte (TiB) | 240 |
| Petabytes (PB) | 1015 | pebibyte (GdP) | 250 |
| Exabyte (EB) | 1018 | Exbibyte (EiB) | 260 |
| zettabytes (ZB) | 1021 | Zebibyte (ZiB) | 270 |
| Yottabyte (YB) | 1024 | Yobibyte (YiB) | 280 |
What are Gigabits per second and how does it differ from Gigabyte?
It is a unit of measure of transmission of information has as symbol the 'Gb' or 'Gbit' and an equivalence of 109 bits. Refers to the amount of binary values that can be transmitted in one second, expressing itself as 'Gbps'
El gigabit equals 1/8 of a gigabyteas they are based on different units. The Gigabit is based on the bits Meanwhile he Gigabyte is based on bytes (which is 8 bits). Hence 1 gigabyte is equivalent to 8 gigabits.
Usually the gigabits per second are used to describe bandwidth. Most connection ports express the amount of information they can transmit in this unit of measure. It is also commonly used for internet speeds.
Thus:
- 1Gbps = 1000Mbps
- 1GB (capacity / size) = 8Gbps (speed)
Confusions with the gigabyte and the gibibyte
The manufacturers of hard drives express the capacities of these storage units using the decimal prefix. With increasing capacities, manufacturers continue to use the decimal version of the gigabyte for its commercial interpretation. This causes the exact capacity of a commercial model to be slightly higher than the physical capacity of the unit.
All manufacturers of hard drives, flash memory, and the like use the interpretation of gigabyte as 1 bytes.
Some old versions of Microsoft Windows or Linux expressed the capacity of the hard disk in binary multipliers. More recently this distinction on the part of operating systems is no longer made, generating confusion. Hence in many cases there is a discrepancy between the capacity labeled on a hard drive and the capacity displayed by the operating system.
The difference between units based on decimal and binary prefixes increases based on a semi-logarithmic function. The decimal value of a megabyte is less than 96% of a mebigyte, and a gigabyte is slightly more than 93% of a gibibyte. For example, a 500GB hard drive has an actual operating system capacity of 467GiB (approximately)
Data size equivalence table
| kilobyte | 1 KB | kibibyte | 0.976563 KiB |
| megabyte | 1 MB | mebibyte | 0.953674 MiB |
| Gigabyte | 1 GB | Gibibytes | 0.931323 GiB |
| Terabytes | 1 TB | Tebibyte | 0.909495TiB |
| Petabytes | 1 PB | Pebibyte | 0.888175 GDP |
To know the 'real' capacity that any operating system would recognize, we just have to multiply the 'commercial' capacity by any the equivalent multiplier in binary (right)
Legal disputes
The difference between commercial labeling and distinction by the operating system has generated different individual and collective lawsuits. In those that have reached a final court ruling, without prior agreement, it has been ruled that there is no fraud.
The US courts have held that "the US Congress has found the decimal definition of gigabyte to be the preferred definition for purposes of commerce in the United States."
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