OT Wrong advertised specifications

Terry said:

A friend of mine just bought a new computer at WalMart. The computer
is a complete set with speakers, mouse, keyboard and monitor. It was
advertised with 1G of memory and the system reports that it is 768K.

She contacted WalMart and Walmart acknowledges that it is a mistake.
Now she has to unplug everything, pack it up and take it back for a
swap.

This is a lot of work. What, if anything, extra should she expect for
her troubles from Walmart or Acer (brand)?

Nothing. That's what you get for shopping at Wal-Mart.
Errors in advertisements and zero compensation unless you
choose to sue.

--Blair

Blair P. Houghton said:

Terry said:

A friend of mine just bought a new computer at WalMart. The computer
is a complete set with speakers, mouse, keyboard and monitor. It was
advertised with 1G of memory and the system reports that it is 768K.

She contacted WalMart and Walmart acknowledges that it is a mistake.
Now she has to unplug everything, pack it up and take it back for a
swap.

This is a lot of work. What, if anything, extra should she expect for
her troubles from Walmart or Acer (brand)?

Nothing. That's what you get for shopping at Wal-Mart.
Errors in advertisements and zero compensation unless you
choose to sue.

--Blair

Good grief! Why would that friend expect anything extra? If you
bought a blender that was supposed to be 7 speeds and you got one with
5, would they replace it and give you a free set of measuring cups as
a consolation prize? NO. You'd just be happy they exchanged it for
you. You'd also be glad they said "sorry" and gave you the one you
wanted in the first place.

Buyer Beware!
(Of course, "size" can be diminished by the OS)

--

Ham and eggs.
A day's work for the chicken, a lifetime commitment for the pig.

In article <[email hidden]>,
[email hidden] says...

Quoted message said:

In article said:

In article <[email hidden]>,
[email hidden] says...

Quoted message said:

In article <o2EDi.7076$3R5.943@trnddc05>, "Paul M. Cook"

Quoted message said:

>
>"Doug Miller" <[email hidden]> wrote in message
>news:[email hidden]...
>> In article <[email hidden]>, "HeyBub"
><[email hidden]> wrote:
>> >Doug Miller wrote:
>> >> In article <ORxDi.12718$sf1.3859@trnddc01>, "Paul M. Cook"
>> >> <[email hidden]> wrote:
>> >>
>> >>> Nope. It is not. Shortness means nothing, speed means everything.
>> >>
>> >> You think the length of the signal path has nothing to do with speed?
>> >
>> >Waves hand!
>> >
>> >I do! I do! Pick me!
>>
>> You are aware, aren't you, that the speed of signal propagation is finite?
>
>First, you have something called a clock in the computer. All computers
>have a clock, they cannot run without one. Second, the signals can only be
>passed during a clock cycle. The speed of light is far faster than any
>clock we can employ

You think so, do you?

1GHz clock rate = 1 nanosecond cycle length. How far do you suppose light
moves in a nanosecond?

On a motherboard, about eight inches (a foot in air). Not that that
fact has anything to do with the maximum clock frequency achievable.

You might want to rethink that notion...

It doesn't. Latency <> bandwidth.

--
Keith

In article <bPVDi.1802$s06.267@trnddc04>,
[email hidden] says...

Quoted message said:

"krw" <[email hidden]> wrote in message
news:[email hidden]...

Quoted message said:

In article <[email hidden]>,
[email hidden] says...

Quoted message said:

Terry <[email hidden]> wrote in
news:[email hidden]:

> They are just padding the numbers. It is a good thing she found this
> information before she packed it up and took it back for nothing.

While I agree that the advertising is misleading it is common practice
to report installed memory as opposed to 'usable' memory.

Likewise for hard disks, where the size is often reported as

unformatted,

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

which is completely useless, of course. Then depending on what file
system it is formatted in (NTFS for example) you get a big chunk devoted
to the file system and not available for your stuff.

No, there is no difference between formatted and unformatted disk
size (unformatted disk drives don't exist in the wild). The issue is
that disks are sold by the decimal megabyte (10^6 bytes) rather than
binary "megabytes" (2^16 bytes) as memory is.

No you're wrong again. Disks are indeed just blank platters until formatted
which is why when you buy a hard drive it does not say "for PCs only."

Wrong. Hard disk are formatted at the factory. They're non-
functional without formatting. I haven't seen a disk marked "for PCs
only" since the year of the flood.

Quoted message said:

You
can take any SCSI drive for example and use it in a PC, MAC, Unix, VMS, IBM,
Cray, Unisys or whatever - all sharing the same interface, all incompatible
file systems and drive formats and logical architecture. Depending on the
OS and the file system, there is loss due to allocation table overhead and
also due to the fact that under NTFS and most others such as FAT and FAT32
there are the same number of sectors per track.

File system <> formatting. The OS can install its own filesystem.
It *cannot* format a modern drive. Without formatting the hardware
has no clue how to access the drive - no index marks, no track marks,
no clocks, nothing.

Quoted message said:

Very few OSs actually use
variable sector mapping. Oddly enough the old Commodore 64 was one. You
fit the same number of sectors on a center track as an edge track therefore
you lose more space at the outside of the disk. Picture a pie cut in
wedges.

No, modern disk have more sectors on the outside tracks (see: "zoned
recording"😉. The sectors are the same sized though. Variable
sectors aren't worth the overhead, given the size of disks these
days.

Quoted message said:

Originally, disk drives were actually drums for this very reason -
far easier to work with and the only way they could get any respectable
capacity - and where we get terms like cylinder from. The next factor is
the cluster size itself. Smaller clusters require more management but are
less wasteful. Larger clusters waste more space but are better for ECC and
performance.

Meaningless to the discussion...

Quoted message said:

For the sake of this discussion, NTFS has about a 10% file overhead. A 160
GB drive will format out to about 145-148 GB. The rest is just wasted space
and table space. This is a general rule of thumb as NTFS chooses the
cluster size based on the partition size. You can however, change that.
You can run NTFS with different cluster sizes but it introduces other
issues. As disk formats go, NTFS is one of the more wasteful. But it
really does not matter since the cost per gig is so incredibly low.

Also meaningless...

Quoted message said:

Class dismissed.

Demand a tuition refund.

--
Keith

"krw" <[email hidden]> wrote in message
news:[email hidden]...

Quoted message said:

In article <bPVDi.1802$s06.267@trnddc04>,
[email hidden] says...

Quoted message said:

"krw" <[email hidden]> wrote in message
news:[email hidden]...

Quoted message said:

In article <[email hidden]>,
[email hidden] says...
> Terry <[email hidden]> wrote in
> news:[email hidden]:
>
> > They are just padding the numbers. It is a good thing she found
> > this
> > information before she packed it up and took it back for nothing.
>
>
> While I agree that the advertising is misleading it is common
> practice
> to report installed memory as opposed to 'usable' memory.
>
> Likewise for hard disks, where the size is often reported as

unformatted,

Quoted message said:

> which is completely useless, of course. Then depending on what file
> system it is formatted in (NTFS for example) you get a big chunk
> devoted
> to the file system and not available for your stuff.

No, there is no difference between formatted and unformatted disk
size (unformatted disk drives don't exist in the wild). The issue is
that disks are sold by the decimal megabyte (10^6 bytes) rather than
binary "megabytes" (2^16 bytes) as memory is.

No you're wrong again. Disks are indeed just blank platters until
formatted
which is why when you buy a hard drive it does not say "for PCs only."

Wrong. Hard disk are formatted at the factory. They're non-
functional without formatting. I haven't seen a disk marked "for PCs
only" since the year of the flood.

Quoted message said:

You
can take any SCSI drive for example and use it in a PC, MAC, Unix, VMS,
IBM,
Cray, Unisys or whatever - all sharing the same interface, all
incompatible
file systems and drive formats and logical architecture. Depending on
the
OS and the file system, there is loss due to allocation table overhead
and
also due to the fact that under NTFS and most others such as FAT and
FAT32
there are the same number of sectors per track.

File system <> formatting. The OS can install its own filesystem.
It *cannot* format a modern drive. Without formatting the hardware
has no clue how to access the drive - no index marks, no track marks,
no clocks, nothing.

Quoted message said:

Very few OSs actually use
variable sector mapping. Oddly enough the old Commodore 64 was one. You
fit the same number of sectors on a center track as an edge track
therefore
you lose more space at the outside of the disk. Picture a pie cut in
wedges.

No, modern disk have more sectors on the outside tracks (see: "zoned
recording"😉. The sectors are the same sized though. Variable
sectors aren't worth the overhead, given the size of disks these
days.

Quoted message said:

Originally, disk drives were actually drums for this very reason -
far easier to work with and the only way they could get any respectable
capacity - and where we get terms like cylinder from. The next factor is
the cluster size itself. Smaller clusters require more management but
are
less wasteful. Larger clusters waste more space but are better for ECC
and
performance.

Meaningless to the discussion...

Quoted message said:

For the sake of this discussion, NTFS has about a 10% file overhead. A
160
GB drive will format out to about 145-148 GB. The rest is just wasted
space
and table space. This is a general rule of thumb as NTFS chooses the
cluster size based on the partition size. You can however, change that.
You can run NTFS with different cluster sizes but it introduces other
issues. As disk formats go, NTFS is one of the more wasteful. But it
really does not matter since the cost per gig is so incredibly low.

Also meaningless...

Quoted message said:

Class dismissed.

Demand a tuition refund.

--
Keith

bah.. unfamiliar with low level factory formatting I see.. (which really is
irrelevant to the disk size issue, they simply use a different definition of
a megabyte, manufacturers define it at 1,000,000 bytes, while the os works
only in numbers divisible by 8, starting at the kilobyte)
maybe this will help with the formatting
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Low_level_format#Two_levels_of_formatting

Quoted message said:

She went to Acer's web site and it turns out that it is true that 256k
is being used for video.

They are just padding the numbers. It is a good thing she found this
information before she packed it up and took it back for nothing.

They're not padding anything. The machine has 1 gig. Just because
she doesn't understand computer architecture doesn't mean she's
getting ripped off.

Dark1 said:

"krw" <[email hidden]> wrote in message
news:[email hidden]...

Quoted message said:

In article <bPVDi.1802$s06.267@trnddc04>,
[email hidden] says...

Quoted message said:

"krw" <[email hidden]> wrote in message
news:[email hidden]...
> In article <[email hidden]>,
> [email hidden] says...
>> Terry <[email hidden]> wrote in
>> news:[email hidden]:
>>
>>> They are just padding the numbers. It is a good thing she found
>>> this
>>> information before she packed it up and took it back for nothing.
>>
>>
>> While I agree that the advertising is misleading it is common
>> practice
>> to report installed memory as opposed to 'usable' memory.
>>
>> Likewise for hard disks, where the size is often reported as
>> unformatted, which is completely useless, of course. Then
>> depending on what file system it is formatted in (NTFS for
>> example) you get a big chunk devoted
>> to the file system and not available for your stuff.
>
> No, there is no difference between formatted and unformatted disk
> size (unformatted disk drives don't exist in the wild). The issue
> is that disks are sold by the decimal megabyte (10^6 bytes) rather
> than binary "megabytes" (2^16 bytes) as memory is.

No you're wrong again. Disks are indeed just blank platters until
formatted
which is why when you buy a hard drive it does not say "for PCs
only."

Wrong. Hard disk are formatted at the factory. They're non-
functional without formatting. I haven't seen a disk marked "for PCs
only" since the year of the flood.

Quoted message said:

You
can take any SCSI drive for example and use it in a PC, MAC, Unix,
VMS, IBM,
Cray, Unisys or whatever - all sharing the same interface, all
incompatible
file systems and drive formats and logical architecture. Depending
on the
OS and the file system, there is loss due to allocation table
overhead and
also due to the fact that under NTFS and most others such as FAT and
FAT32
there are the same number of sectors per track.

File system <> formatting. The OS can install its own filesystem.
It *cannot* format a modern drive. Without formatting the hardware
has no clue how to access the drive - no index marks, no track marks,
no clocks, nothing.

Quoted message said:

Very few OSs actually use
variable sector mapping. Oddly enough the old Commodore 64 was
one. You fit the same number of sectors on a center track as an
edge track therefore
you lose more space at the outside of the disk. Picture a pie cut
in wedges.

No, modern disk have more sectors on the outside tracks (see: "zoned
recording"😉. The sectors are the same sized though. Variable
sectors aren't worth the overhead, given the size of disks these
days.

Quoted message said:

Originally, disk drives were actually drums for this very reason -
far easier to work with and the only way they could get any
respectable capacity - and where we get terms like cylinder from. The next factor is the cluster size itself.
Smaller clusters
require more management but are
less wasteful. Larger clusters waste more space but are better for
ECC and
performance.

Meaningless to the discussion...

Quoted message said:

For the sake of this discussion, NTFS has about a 10% file
overhead. A 160
GB drive will format out to about 145-148 GB. The rest is just
wasted space
and table space. This is a general rule of thumb as NTFS chooses
the cluster size based on the partition size. You can however,
change that. You can run NTFS with different cluster sizes but it
introduces other issues. As disk formats go, NTFS is one of the
more wasteful. But it really does not matter since the cost per
gig is so incredibly low.

Also meaningless...

Quoted message said:

Class dismissed.

Demand a tuition refund.

Quoted message said:

bah.. unfamiliar with low level factory formatting I see.. (which really is irrelevant to the disk size issue, they
simply use a different definition of a megabyte, manufacturers define it at 1,000,000 bytes,

So does the SI.

Quoted message said:

while the os works only in numbers divisible by 8, starting at the kilobyte)

Pig ignorant lie. Even the MS OSs often report the decimal format.

Quoted message said:

maybe this will help with the formatting
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Low_level_format#Two_levels_of_formatting

It clearly didnt help you.

In article <[email hidden]>,
[email hidden] says...

Quoted message said:

"krw" <[email hidden]> wrote in message
news:[email hidden]...

Quoted message said:

In article <bPVDi.1802$s06.267@trnddc04>,
[email hidden] says...

Quoted message said:

"krw" <[email hidden]> wrote in message
news:[email hidden]...
> In article <[email hidden]>,
> [email hidden] says...
> > Terry <[email hidden]> wrote in
> > news:[email hidden]:
> >
> > > They are just padding the numbers. It is a good thing she found
> > > this
> > > information before she packed it up and took it back for nothing.
> >
> >
> > While I agree that the advertising is misleading it is common
> > practice
> > to report installed memory as opposed to 'usable' memory.
> >
> > Likewise for hard disks, where the size is often reported as
unformatted,
> > which is completely useless, of course. Then depending on what file
> > system it is formatted in (NTFS for example) you get a big chunk
> > devoted
> > to the file system and not available for your stuff.
>
> No, there is no difference between formatted and unformatted disk
> size (unformatted disk drives don't exist in the wild). The issue is
> that disks are sold by the decimal megabyte (10^6 bytes) rather than
> binary "megabytes" (2^16 bytes) as memory is.

No you're wrong again. Disks are indeed just blank platters until
formatted
which is why when you buy a hard drive it does not say "for PCs only."

Wrong. Hard disk are formatted at the factory. They're non-
functional without formatting. I haven't seen a disk marked "for PCs
only" since the year of the flood.

Quoted message said:

You
can take any SCSI drive for example and use it in a PC, MAC, Unix, VMS,
IBM,
Cray, Unisys or whatever - all sharing the same interface, all
incompatible
file systems and drive formats and logical architecture. Depending on
the
OS and the file system, there is loss due to allocation table overhead
and
also due to the fact that under NTFS and most others such as FAT and
FAT32
there are the same number of sectors per track.

File system <> formatting. The OS can install its own filesystem.
It *cannot* format a modern drive. Without formatting the hardware
has no clue how to access the drive - no index marks, no track marks,
no clocks, nothing.

Quoted message said:

Very few OSs actually use
variable sector mapping. Oddly enough the old Commodore 64 was one. You
fit the same number of sectors on a center track as an edge track
therefore
you lose more space at the outside of the disk. Picture a pie cut in
wedges.

No, modern disk have more sectors on the outside tracks (see: "zoned
recording"😉. The sectors are the same sized though. Variable
sectors aren't worth the overhead, given the size of disks these
days.

Quoted message said:

Originally, disk drives were actually drums for this very reason -
far easier to work with and the only way they could get any respectable
capacity - and where we get terms like cylinder from. The next factor is
the cluster size itself. Smaller clusters require more management but
are
less wasteful. Larger clusters waste more space but are better for ECC
and
performance.

Meaningless to the discussion...

Quoted message said:

For the sake of this discussion, NTFS has about a 10% file overhead. A
160
GB drive will format out to about 145-148 GB. The rest is just wasted
space
and table space. This is a general rule of thumb as NTFS chooses the
cluster size based on the partition size. You can however, change that.
You can run NTFS with different cluster sizes but it introduces other
issues. As disk formats go, NTFS is one of the more wasteful. But it
really does not matter since the cost per gig is so incredibly low.

Also meaningless...

Quoted message said:

Class dismissed.

Demand a tuition refund.

--
Keith

bah.. unfamiliar with low level factory formatting I see..

I'm quite familiar with the concept. You, OTOH, haven't heard that
LLF went out with button hooks. It's been at least 20 years since
users were capable of doing a LLF. The hardware ain't there.

Quoted message said:

(which really is
irrelevant to the disk size issue, they simply use a different definition of
a megabyte, manufacturers define it at 1,000,000 bytes,

Which is what I said.

Quoted message said:

while the os works
only in numbers divisible by 8, starting at the kilobyte)

Divisible by 8? Not many PCs use octal.

Quoted message said:

maybe this will help with the formatting
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Low_level_format#Two_levels_of_formatting

Whatever...

Like I said, demand a refund.

--
Keith

[snip]

Quoted message said:

bah.. unfamiliar with low level factory formatting I see.. (which really is
irrelevant to the disk size issue, they simply use a different definition of
a megabyte, manufacturers define it at 1,000,000 bytes, while the os works
only in numbers divisible by 8, starting at the kilobyte)

It's powers of 2 (1 kilobyte = 1024 = 2^10). 8 = 2^3, just one of
those powers.

Quoted message said:

maybe this will help with the formatting
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Low_level_format#Two_levels_of_formatting

--
102 days until the winter solstice celebration

Mark Lloyd
http://notstupid.laughingsquid.com

"DISCLAIMER If you find a posting or message
from me offensive, inappropriate, or disruptive,
please ignore it. If you don't know how to
ignore a posting, complain to me and I will
demonstrate."

On Fri, 14 Sep 2007 15:52:51 -0400, krw <[email hidden]> wrote:

[snip]

Quoted message said:

I'm quite familiar with the concept. You, OTOH, haven't heard that
LLF went out with button hooks. It's been at least 20 years since
users were capable of doing a LLF. The hardware ain't there.

Low-level format is a necessity. If your drive wasn't low-level
formatted (which must be done at the factory), it would be unusable.

HIGH level formatting is what your computer does. That's writing the
OS to the sectors created by LLF.

To confuse matters, people are CALLING something they can do a LLF,
when it just writes 0 bytes to existing sectors. It's not a LLF at
all.

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

(which really is
irrelevant to the disk size issue, they simply use a different definition of
a megabyte, manufacturers define it at 1,000,000 bytes,

Which is what I said.

Quoted message said:

while the os works
only in numbers divisible by 8, starting at the kilobyte)

Divisible by 8? Not many PCs use octal.

None do. They use binary. Other bases (octal, decimal, hexadecimal,
etc...) do not exist within the computer, but are just ideas present
in the users' minds.

Maybe the number you're looking for is 1,048,576 which is 2^20.

[snip]
--
102 days until the winter solstice celebration

Mark Lloyd
http://notstupid.laughingsquid.com

"DISCLAIMER If you find a posting or message
from me offensive, inappropriate, or disruptive,
please ignore it. If you don't know how to
ignore a posting, complain to me and I will
demonstrate."

In article <[email hidden]>,
[email hidden] says...

Quoted message said:

On Fri, 14 Sep 2007 15:52:51 -0400, krw <[email hidden]> wrote:

[snip]

Quoted message said:

I'm quite familiar with the concept. You, OTOH, haven't heard that
LLF went out with button hooks. It's been at least 20 years since
users were capable of doing a LLF. The hardware ain't there.

Low-level format is a necessity. If your drive wasn't low-level
formatted (which must be done at the factory), it would be unusable.

[censored]. It is *only* done at the factory as part of the
manufacturing process. The drive cannot function without the
formatting. That is, the user cannot LLF a modern drive. Speaking
of a drive's LLF is meaningless.

Quoted message said:

HIGH level formatting is what your computer does. That's writing the
OS to the sectors created by LLF.

The LLF is done by specialized hardware. LLF is really a meaningless
concept on modern drives. There is no "unformatted size".

Quoted message said:

To confuse matters, people are CALLING something they can do a LLF,
when it just writes 0 bytes to existing sectors. It's not a LLF at
all.

Nope. It's writing '0's to the disk. ;-)

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

(which really is
irrelevant to the disk size issue, they simply use a different definition of
a megabyte, manufacturers define it at 1,000,000 bytes,

Which is what I said.

Quoted message said:

while the os works
only in numbers divisible by 8, starting at the kilobyte)

Divisible by 8? Not many PCs use octal.

None do. They use binary. Other bases (octal, decimal, hexadecimal,
etc...) do not exist within the computer, but are just ideas present
in the users' minds.

Of course, sorta. The PDP-11 was an octal machine (three-bit op-code
fields), even some documentation and panel markings were in
hexadecimal. It's just as correct to call binary the figment of the
imagination.

Quoted message said:

Maybe the number you're looking for is 1,048,576 which is 2^20.

I'm not the one with the elementary arithmetic problem.

--
Keith

krw said:

In article <[email hidden]>,
[email hidden] says...

Quoted message said:

On Fri, 14 Sep 2007 15:52:51 -0400, krw <[email hidden]> wrote:

[snip]

Quoted message said:

I'm quite familiar with the concept. You, OTOH, haven't heard that
LLF went out with button hooks. It's been at least 20 years since
users were capable of doing a LLF. The hardware ain't there.

Low-level format is a necessity. If your drive wasn't low-level
formatted (which must be done at the factory), it would be unusable.

[censored]. It is *only* done at the factory as part of the
manufacturing process. The drive cannot function without the
formatting. That is, the user cannot LLF a modern drive. Speaking
of a drive's LLF is meaningless.

Quoted message said:

HIGH level formatting is what your computer does. That's writing the
OS to the sectors created by LLF.

The LLF is done by specialized hardware. LLF is really a meaningless
concept on modern drives. There is no "unformatted size".

Quoted message said:

To confuse matters, people are CALLING something they can do a LLF,
when it just writes 0 bytes to existing sectors. It's not a LLF at
all.

Nope. It's writing '0's to the disk. ;-)

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

> (which really is
> irrelevant to the disk size issue, they simply use a different
> definition of a megabyte, manufacturers define it at 1,000,000
> bytes,

Which is what I said.

> while the os works
> only in numbers divisible by 8, starting at the kilobyte)

Divisible by 8? Not many PCs use octal.

None do. They use binary. Other bases (octal, decimal, hexadecimal,
etc...) do not exist within the computer, but are just ideas present
in the users' minds.

Quoted message said:

Of course, sorta. The PDP-11 was an octal machine

No it isnt.

Quoted message said:

(three-bit op-code fields),

That doesnt make it an octal machine.

Quoted message said:

even some documentation and panel markings were in hexadecimal.
It's just as correct to call binary the figment of the imagination.

Nope, thats what the hardware does, the others are just
representations of binary that are more convenient for humans.

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

Maybe the number you're looking for is 1,048,576 which is 2^20.

Quoted message said:

I'm not the one with the elementary arithmetic problem.

krw said:

In article <[email hidden]>,
[email hidden] says...

Quoted message said:

On Fri, 14 Sep 2007 15:52:51 -0400, krw <[email hidden]> wrote:

[snip]

Quoted message said:

I'm quite familiar with the concept. You, OTOH, haven't heard that
LLF went out with button hooks. It's been at least 20 years since
users were capable of doing a LLF. The hardware ain't there.

Low-level format is a necessity. If your drive wasn't low-level
formatted (which must be done at the factory), it would be unusable.

[censored].

Apparently some really unusual definition of "[censored]".

Quoted message said:

It is *only* done at the factory as part of the
manufacturing process. The drive cannot function without the
formatting.

You admit it's essential...

Quoted message said:

That is, the user cannot LLF a modern drive.

As I said.

Quoted message said:

Speaking
of a drive's LLF is meaningless.

Read your own writing...

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

HIGH level formatting is what your computer does. That's writing the
OS to the sectors created by LLF.

The LLF is done by specialized hardware. LLF is really a meaningless
concept on modern drives.

Also strange. Something can't be both meaningless and essential.

Quoted message said:

There is no "unformatted size".

Sure there is. Consider the density of stored information within a
sector, and apply that information to the entire surface(s).

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

To confuse matters, people are CALLING something they can do a LLF,
when it just writes 0 bytes to existing sectors. It's not a LLF at
all.

Nope.

Quoted message said:

It's writing '0's to the disk. ;-)

Exactly what I said. Try reading before you try to disagree.

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

> (which really is
> irrelevant to the disk size issue, they simply use a different definition of
> a megabyte, manufacturers define it at 1,000,000 bytes,

Which is what I said.

> while the os works
> only in numbers divisible by 8, starting at the kilobyte)

Divisible by 8? Not many PCs use octal.

None do. They use binary. Other bases (octal, decimal, hexadecimal,
etc...) do not exist within the computer, but are just ideas present
in the users' minds.

Of course, sorta. The PDP-11 was an octal machine (three-bit op-code
fields),

Which DOES NOT make it octal. It's just 3-bit binary (just like 394 is
a 3-digit decimal numeral, not base 1000). Octal is a HUMAN
representation of what's going on. Nothing to do with the computer
itself.

Quoted message said:

even some documentation and panel markings were in
hexadecimal.

Actually those are alphanumeric characters. Hex is your
interpretation. Anyway, they're for people to read. Nothing to do
with what the computer is doing.

Quoted message said:

It's just as correct to call binary the figment of the
imagination.

Wrong. Binary has a 1:1 correspondence with the computer's internal
data processing. No other base does.

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

Maybe the number you're looking for is 1,048,576 which is 2^20.

I'm not the one with the elementary arithmetic problem.

--
101 days until the winter solstice celebration

Mark Lloyd
http://notstupid.laughingsquid.com

"DISCLAIMER If you find a posting or message
from me offensive, inappropriate, or disruptive,
please ignore it. If you don't know how to
ignore a posting, complain to me and I will
demonstrate."

In article <[email hidden]>,
[email hidden] says...

Quoted message said:

krw said:

In article <[email hidden]>,
[email hidden] says...

Quoted message said:

On Fri, 14 Sep 2007 15:52:51 -0400, krw <[email hidden]> wrote:

[snip]

>
> I'm quite familiar with the concept. You, OTOH, haven't heard that
> LLF went out with button hooks. It's been at least 20 years since
> users were capable of doing a LLF. The hardware ain't there.
>

Low-level format is a necessity. If your drive wasn't low-level
formatted (which must be done at the factory), it would be unusable.

[censored]. It is *only* done at the factory as part of the
manufacturing process. The drive cannot function without the
formatting. That is, the user cannot LLF a modern drive. Speaking
of a drive's LLF is meaningless.

Quoted message said:

HIGH level formatting is what your computer does. That's writing the
OS to the sectors created by LLF.

The LLF is done by specialized hardware. LLF is really a meaningless
concept on modern drives. There is no "unformatted size".

Quoted message said:

To confuse matters, people are CALLING something they can do a LLF,
when it just writes 0 bytes to existing sectors. It's not a LLF at
all.

Nope. It's writing '0's to the disk. ;-)

Quoted message said:

>> (which really is
>> irrelevant to the disk size issue, they simply use a different
>> definition of a megabyte, manufacturers define it at 1,000,000
>> bytes,
>
> Which is what I said.
>
>> while the os works
>> only in numbers divisible by 8, starting at the kilobyte)
>
> Divisible by 8? Not many PCs use octal.
>

None do. They use binary. Other bases (octal, decimal, hexadecimal,
etc...) do not exist within the computer, but are just ideas present
in the users' minds.

Quoted message said:

Of course, sorta. The PDP-11 was an octal machine

No it isnt.

Quoted message said:

(three-bit op-code fields),

That doesnt make it an octal machine.

Sure it does Ron, as much as it is a binary machine. Of course
you're only in this for the argument, as usual, so I'll let you have
it your way.

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

even some documentation and panel markings were in hexadecimal.
It's just as correct to call binary the figment of the imagination.

Nope, thats what the hardware does, the others are just
representations of binary that are more convenient for humans.

Nope. I choose to group the hardware in threes. It's then octal.

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

Maybe the number you're looking for is 1,048,576 which is 2^20.

Quoted message said:

I'm not the one with the elementary arithmetic problem.

I'm not the one with Ron syndrome either.

--
Keith

krw <[email hidden]> wrote

Quoted message said:

Rod Speed [email hidden] wrote

Quoted message said:

krw said:

[email hidden] says...
> krw <[email hidden]> wrote

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

>> I'm quite familiar with the concept. You, OTOH, haven't heard
>> that LLF went out with button hooks. It's been at least 20 years
>> since users were capable of doing a LLF. The hardware ain't there.

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

> Low-level format is a necessity. If your drive wasn't low-level
> formatted (which must be done at the factory), it would be unusable.

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

[censored]. It is *only* done at the factory as part of the
manufacturing process. The drive cannot function without the
formatting. That is, the user cannot LLF a modern drive. Speaking
of a drive's LLF is meaningless.

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

> HIGH level formatting is what your computer does.
> That's writing the OS to the sectors created by LLF.

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

The LLF is done by specialized hardware. LLF is really a meaningless
concept on modern drives. There is no "unformatted size".

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

> To confuse matters, people are CALLING something they can do a LLF,
> when it just writes 0 bytes to existing sectors. It's not a LLF at all.

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

Nope. It's writing '0's to the disk. ;-)

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

>>> (which really is irrelevant to the disk size issue, they simply use a different
>>> definition of a megabyte, manufacturers define it at 1,000,000 bytes,

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

>> Which is what I said.

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

>>> while the os works only in numbers divisible by 8, starting at the kilobyte)

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

>> Divisible by 8? Not many PCs use octal.

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

> None do. They use binary. Other bases (octal, decimal, hexadecimal,
> etc...) do not exist within the computer, but are just ideas
> present in the users' minds.

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

Of course, sorta. The PDP-11 was an octal machine

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

No it isnt.

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

(three-bit op-code fields),

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

That doesnt make it an octal machine.

Quoted message said:

Sure it does Ron, as much as it is a binary machine.

Nope. Binary is the fundamental organisation of the machine.

Octal and hex are just convenient representations
of binary for humans, a different matter entirely.

Quoted message said:

Of course you're only in this for the argument, as usual,

Corse you never ever do anything like that yourself, eh ?

Quoted message said:

so I'll let you have it your way.

You get no say what so ever on that or anything else at all, ever.

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

even some documentation and panel markings were in hexadecimal.
It's just as correct to call binary the figment of the imagination.

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

Nope, thats what the hardware does, the others are just
representations of binary that are more convenient for humans.

Quoted message said:

Nope. I choose to group the hardware in threes.

Nope, the PDP11 doesnt even do that. Most of its ops are on bytes, not 3 bit groups.

Quoted message said:

It's then octal.

Nope.

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

> Maybe the number you're looking for is 1,048,576 which is 2^20.

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

I'm not the one with the elementary arithmetic problem.

Quoted message said:

I'm not the one with Ron syndrome either.

You clearly have a massive problem between those ears tho, whatever you call it.

si esto no es un error el equipo dice.. 252 Mb de video GMA X3100 ojo
(252) y en las especificaciones del portatil dice --> 1G Ram = 1024
mb entonces

1024
252 -
---------
772 Mb -----> esta es la RAM libre.. en las especificaiones dice 252
Mb de video (SHARE) compartido .. solo es un poco de desconociemiento
de las cosas... de todos modos el computador es ta muy barato.. porque
tiene un procesador CELERON M estos son nuevos procesadores de pentium
son los llamados roseta. y la acelaradora GMA X3100 es excelente
para correr con la mierda de windows vista... entonces en alguna otra
parte encontraran un portatil a 348 ?????? HAA?? piensenlo.. pero ya
no hay nada que pensar. lso computadores se acabaron a los 15 minutos,
la gente hizo espera desde las 4 de la mañana ... les recomiendo que
esten pendientes para el proximo jueves en la noche o viernes en la
mañana... quedan 3 viernes negros

-----------
English----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

if this is not an error the team he/she says.. 252 Mb of video GMA
X3100 eye (252) and in the specifications of the portable one he/she
says--> 1G Ram = 1024 mb then

1024
252 -
---------
772 Mb-----> this it is the free RAM.. in the especi 252 Mb of video
says (SHARE) shared.. alone it is some desconociemiento of the
things... anyway the computer is very cheap ta.. because this a
processor CELERON M these they are new pentium processors they are the
calls roseta. and the acelaradora GMA X3100 is excellent to run with
the windows vista seen... then in some other part they did find a
portable one at $348?????? HAA?? does think it.. but is anything no
longer to think. lso computers finished to the 15 minutes, people made
wait from 4 in the morning... I recommend them that they are pending
for next Thursday in the night or Friday in the morning... they are 3
black Friday