1.2.7

Capacity

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Units of Capacity

The capacity of a device is how much data it can store. It is important to know the units of capacity so that we can compare the capacity of different devices.

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The bit

  • The smallest unit of data that we can store is called a binary digit, or a bit for short.
  • The value of a bit can be either a 0 or a 1.
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Grouping bits

  • Because a bit is so small, we do not usually use it to measure data.
  • Instead, we group bits into larger groups such as:
    • Nibble (4 bits).
    • Byte (8 bits).
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Common data units

  • In reality, we need much larger groups than this to compare modern storage devices.
  • Common units are:
    • Kilobyte (KB) (1000 bytes).
    • Megabyte (MB) (1000 KB).
    • Gigabyte (GB) (1000 MB).
    • Terabyte (TB) (1000 GB).
    • Petabyte (1,000 TB).

Jump to other topics

1Computer Systems

1.1Systems Architecture

1.2Memory & Storage

1.3Computer Networks, Connections & Protocols

1.4Network Security

1.5Systems Software

1.6Ethical, Legal, Cultural & Environmental Concern

2Computational Thinking, Algorithms and Programming

2.1Algorithms

2.2Programming Fundamentals

2.3Producing Robust Programs

2.4Boolean Logic

2.5Programming Languages & IDEs

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