4 ms·

> There was some time when 3.14 MB was a big unit of measurement I don't know what storage medium that refers to. Plain old 3.5" floppies only went up to 1.44

> There was some time when 3.14 MB was a big unit of measurement I don't know what storage medium that refers to. Plain old 3.5" floppies only went up to 1.44 MB.

SamBam 7y ago
You know how old computers always rounded things to the nearest pi...
- B1FF_PSUVM 7y ago
  Get out of here. (Still sore Apple did not stick to the 1kB = 1000 bytes of the original MacOS and gave in to the "powers of two" insanity ;-)
  - JoeAltmaier 7y ago
    Yeah that was great - you could not actually represent real computer resources correctly without 4 decimal places.
    - saagarjha 7y ago
      When was the last time you bought something that gave you exactly 1073741824 bytes to the gigabyte on the box?
      - colejohnson66 7y ago
        A RAM module?
      - JoeAltmaier 7y ago
        I do embedded a lot. Everything is powers of two.
        B1FF_PSUVM 7y ago
        Including data transmission?
  - codetrotter 7y ago
    I don't get why you are being downvoted. Are people not familiar with the expression "get out of here" used in a friendly manner? Or do they really downvote you because they think it is so bad that you think that 1kB should be equal to 1000 bytes? I mean, I don't agree with you either but IMO the downvote should only be used for things that are either factually wrong, or which detract strongly from the conversation, or which contribute nothing at all. I think your comment is nice and it does not deserve to be downvoted.
    - lioeters 7y ago
      Yeah, apparently downvotes can be used as a "disagree" signal. Usually when I see a comment being unfairly downvoted that way, I upvote as a counter-balance, even if I disagree with the argument (i.e., how many bytes in 1kB).
  - comex 7y ago
    > (Still sore Apple did not stick to the 1kB = 1000 bytes of the original MacOS and gave in to the "powers of two" insanity ;-) Actually, Apple switched back to 1kb = 1000 bytes ("back" assuming you're right about the original MacOS) with Snow Leopard back in 2009. [1] [1] https://blog.macsales.com/1852-snow-leopard-changes-they-way-we-look-at-gigabytes-and-megabytes-and-kilobytes-as-well/ https://blog.macsales.com/1852-snow-leopard-changes-they-way...
tetha 7y ago
Oh. You are correct. I don't know how I ended up with PI there.
logfromblammo 7y ago
NeXT 3.5" floppy drives could do 2.88 MB, but that was at a time when Iomega Zip and Jaz drives were bridging between floppy and writable CD.
- nl 7y ago
  2.88MB was supported by most drives and was usable under Linux. You were supposed to use proper 2.88MB floppy, but you could usually get away with using a 1.44MB floppy and reformatting. I'm not entirely sure how well they were supported under Windows though.
  - SmellyGeekBoy 7y ago
    IIRC the Windows 95 install floppies were 2.88MB. With that in mind it's probably safe to assume that they were at least readable even in DOS, although I don't recall being able to format or write to a floppy at that capacity in any version of DOS/Windows.
    - rasz 7y ago
      no, 1.68MB https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Distribution_Media_Format https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Distribution_Media_Format
ZoomZoomZoom 7y ago
A few month back I authoritatively stated that floppies allowed for 3.14Mb, understanding my mistake only a few minutes later and being thoroughly ashamed. Now I now there's some reason behind it, not just a random glitch of memory.
- netsharc 7y ago
  1.44 MB is the wrong number anyway, since its's mixing the deifiniton of Kilo as 1000 and 1024 to get to the Mega.

> There was some time when 3.14 MB was a big unit of measurement I don't know what storage medium that refers to. Plain old 3.5" floppies only went up to 1.44 MB.

SamBam 7y ago

You know how old computers always rounded things to the nearest pi...

B1FF_PSUVM 7y ago
Get out of here. (Still sore Apple did not stick to the 1kB = 1000 bytes of the original MacOS and gave in to the "powers of two" insanity ;-)
- JoeAltmaier 7y ago
  Yeah that was great - you could not actually represent real computer resources correctly without 4 decimal places.
  - saagarjha 7y ago
    When was the last time you bought something that gave you exactly 1073741824 bytes to the gigabyte on the box?
    - colejohnson66 7y ago
      A RAM module?
    - JoeAltmaier 7y ago
      I do embedded a lot. Everything is powers of two.
      - B1FF_PSUVM 7y ago
        Including data transmission?
- codetrotter 7y ago
  I don't get why you are being downvoted. Are people not familiar with the expression "get out of here" used in a friendly manner? Or do they really downvote you because they think it is so bad that you think that 1kB should be equal to 1000 bytes? I mean, I don't agree with you either but IMO the downvote should only be used for things that are either factually wrong, or which detract strongly from the conversation, or which contribute nothing at all. I think your comment is nice and it does not deserve to be downvoted.
  - lioeters 7y ago
    Yeah, apparently downvotes can be used as a "disagree" signal. Usually when I see a comment being unfairly downvoted that way, I upvote as a counter-balance, even if I disagree with the argument (i.e., how many bytes in 1kB).
- comex 7y ago
  > (Still sore Apple did not stick to the 1kB = 1000 bytes of the original MacOS and gave in to the "powers of two" insanity ;-) Actually, Apple switched back to 1kb = 1000 bytes ("back" assuming you're right about the original MacOS) with Snow Leopard back in 2009. [1] [1] https://blog.macsales.com/1852-snow-leopard-changes-they-way-we-look-at-gigabytes-and-megabytes-and-kilobytes-as-well/ https://blog.macsales.com/1852-snow-leopard-changes-they-way...

tetha 7y ago

Oh. You are correct. I don't know how I ended up with PI there.

logfromblammo 7y ago

NeXT 3.5" floppy drives could do 2.88 MB, but that was at a time when Iomega Zip and Jaz drives were bridging between floppy and writable CD.

nl 7y ago
2.88MB was supported by most drives and was usable under Linux. You were supposed to use proper 2.88MB floppy, but you could usually get away with using a 1.44MB floppy and reformatting. I'm not entirely sure how well they were supported under Windows though.
- SmellyGeekBoy 7y ago
  IIRC the Windows 95 install floppies were 2.88MB. With that in mind it's probably safe to assume that they were at least readable even in DOS, although I don't recall being able to format or write to a floppy at that capacity in any version of DOS/Windows.
  - rasz 7y ago
    no, 1.68MB https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Distribution_Media_Format https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Distribution_Media_Format

ZoomZoomZoom 7y ago

A few month back I authoritatively stated that floppies allowed for 3.14Mb, understanding my mistake only a few minutes later and being thoroughly ashamed. Now I now there's some reason behind it, not just a random glitch of memory.

netsharc 7y ago
1.44 MB is the wrong number anyway, since its's mixing the deifiniton of Kilo as 1000 and 1024 to get to the Mega.