Missing GBytes

[Gremlin]

Hi,

I've just taken delivery of a Mesh Elite Q4 FX, and am pleased to say that, overall, I am impressed with the performance. However, the computer was advertised as having a 500 Gbyte hard disc and 4 GBytes of RAM, whereas it seems that a 464 GBYTE hard disc and 3.3 Gbytes of RAM have been fitted.

My question is, "Where have all the GBytes gone?"
Can anyone out there enlighten me?

Regards,
Gremlin

[trebogates]

The hard drive capacity is 500GB when interpreted in decimal, however computers do not work in decimal but in binary, where 1KB (decimal) = 1024 bytes (binary) but would be 1000 Bytes in decimal, and so as repeated upto 500GB results in a big difference in Hard drive capcity beteween what it is sold as (use decimal) and what it is (use binary),


As regard the RAM if your operating system is 32bit (AKA x86) (the most common type e.g XP home/professional/media centre, Vista home basic/Home premium/Ultimate) the most ram it can support is 3.5GB and the rest tends to be "donated" to the onboard graphics regardless of if it is used or not, But if your system is 64bit (AKA x64) (newer, better but not as widely supported e.g XP x64, Vista Home premium 64-bit/Ultimate 64-bit) then most will support upto 8GB RAM, but vista ulimate 64-bit will support upto 128GB RAM, however the actual amount will also depend on the maximum supported but your motherboard, and the BIOS chip

Hope this helps
Rob

[Gremlin]

Thanks for your reply. I am conversant with binary and decimal number systems, but was unaware that vendors used decimal numbers in their adverts. Surely, this is unethical?
I was also unaware of the 3.5 GByte limit on the Vista 32 bit OS, and I am grateful to you for pointing this out.

[trebogates]

i quite agree with using the decimal system as unethical, and would love to see it changed but this will never happen as the magical 1TB (1000GB) HDD would dissappear and become more like 932GB, which just does not have the same ring to it.
i also feel manufactures should be more clear on how much RAM an OS will actually support

[superscaper]

Originally Posted by Gremlin

Thanks for your reply. I am conversant with binary and decimal number systems, but was unaware that vendors used decimal numbers in their adverts. Surely, this is unethical?
I was also unaware of the 3.5 GByte limit on the Vista 32 bit OS, and I am grateful to you for pointing this out.

Unethical maybe but it's standard practice in the memory and hard disc industry to use the SI definition of prefixes which is actually correct but using it with a binary system isn't correct, but using a binary definition is equally incorrect because it contradicts the SI definitions. If everyone used the official binary prefixes there'd be no ambiguity and the simultaneous use of two different definitions for the same terms.

I.e. the use of Gibibytes instead of "Gigabytes". "Gigabyte" itself has no official definition, hence why people who say it's a billion bytes are just as valid as those who say it's 2^30 bytes.