External Hard Drive Size Smaller than Quoted- Not Happy Maxtor!!!

[laimo]

I've recently bought a Maxtor portable HD 640Gb(Model No STM306404EHM301-RK) and discovered that the actual physical storage size available is 596Gb. Did I buy the wrong size or is this a marketing ploy by Maxtor? Surely the formated hard drive cannot use nearly 44Gb for volume info?

Maybe the HD companies should clearly label the actual physical storage size and the logical capacity of these drives.

Not happy Maxtor!!!

[JoshC1]

Don't worry it's not a problem with Maxtor or your hard drive.
All the hard drive manufacturers do this. It's annoying but that's how it is.

Why doesn't my hard drive show the correct size?

The short answer to there's two different measurement formats used. Decimal (GB) and binary (GiB) formats. Binary is used by Windows and decimal is used by the manufacturers. Both the manufacturer and Windows are giving you the "correct" number.

Binary numbers are numbers that are a power of 2.
Decimal numbers are numbers that are a power of 10.

2^10 is 1,024 the closest Decimal number is 10^3 or 1,000
2^20 is 1,048,576 The closest Decimal number is 10^6 or 1,000,000
2^30 is 1,073,741,824 The closest Decimal number is 10^9 or 1,000,000,000

http://articles.networktechs.com/36-p1.php

[laimo]

JoshC1 says:
Don't worry it's not a problem with Maxtor or your hard drive.
All the hard drive manufacturers do this. It's annoying but that's how it is.
http://articles.networktechs.com/36-p1.php

I understand how the binary and the decimal system work. Decimal is more presentable but the actual size in binary is always higher.

If all hard drives are labeled this way then we're all being ripped off. If anyone of you have bought the new one terabyte hard drives what is the actual storage size available to use?

It's like buying a 1Lt milk and you realise its only 68% full!

[Craig Simms]

There was a class action on this in 2007, which was successful against Seagate -- but of course, only customers in the US saw the benefits.

Unfortunately this doesn't look like it's going to change anytime soon, along with TV manufacturers trying to convince people that Dynamic Contrast Ratio, and inserted frames for smooth action are a good thing, or the ridiculous speed claims made by wireless router manufacturers.

Just remember whenever numbers are involved in technology -- caveat emptor. There's a good chance a marketer has been in there fiddling.

[Joey Jojo]

It's because of people like you, they have "1GB = 1 billion bytes; actual formatted capacity less." on the boxes of iPods.

You are getting a 1tb drive, your getting ~1,000,000,000,000 bytes. Less once formatted.

It's like buying a 1Lt milk and you realise its 0.264gal!

[JoshC1]

I agree with you all.
It's so annoying that those greedy companies confuse everyone and rip them off.
I also get angry at how broadband speeds are advertised.
Only the broadband companies use bits whereas everything else uses bytes. This annoys me greatly!

[laimo]

Craig Simms says:
There was a class action on this in 2007, which was successful against Seagate -- but of course, only customers in the US saw the benefits.

Unfortunately this doesn't look like it's going to change anytime soon, along with TV manufacturers trying to convince people that Dynamic Contrast Ratio, and inserted frames for smooth action are a good thing, or the ridiculous speed claims made by wireless router manufacturers.

Just remember whenever numbers are involved in technology -- caveat emptor. There's a good chance a marketer has been in there fiddling.

Where does this leave the consumer? We cant just sit and let these companies fiddle with everything? Isn't there any protection for the consumer at all? ACCC?@#$%

[laimo]

Joey Jojo says:
It's because of people like you, they have "1GB = 1 billion bytes; actual formatted capacity less." on the boxes of iPods.

You are getting a 1tb drive, your getting ~1,000,000,000,000 bytes. Less once formatted.

It's like buying a 1Lt milk and you realise its 0.264gal!

Yes, less once formated, but that's not what you pay for!!!

[Joey Jojo]

laimo says:
Yes, less once formated, but that's not what you pay for!!!

Ok. Your still not getting it. I used my "liter to a gallon" example for a reason.

Forget about formatting.

When you buy a 1 Gigabyte drive, you are getting a 1 Gigabyte drive. ~1099500000000 bytes. There is no misleading, there is no "consumer ripping off" going on. Bits and bytes are different.

Windows shows drives in bits. Therefore when you go to properties, it will show ~879 gigabits. Correct?

Refer to this conversion table. Simply put a "1" under Terabytes, bottom right box, and hit calculate. The numbers on the right are bytes (the number used to advertise the size of the drive), the numbers on the left are bits (the number used to display file/HDD sizes in Windows), although if you do look in properties for the drive, it does display the bytes as well.

Is this now clear?

[Blah]

i just bought a seagate freeagent xtreme 1.5tb today; actual usable amount as quoted by windows is about 1350gb. i expected this though.

manufacturers take advantage of this discrepancy to 'rip' consumers off. as mentioned by craig simm's comment, the class action lawsuit in the states didn't do a whole lot. it makes me wonder how much more effort does it costs them to bring capacities to the actual amount.

the funny thing is that this discrepancy is explicitly written on the box of the external hdd, abeit in small text on the bottom face of the box. it explains of the differences in metrics used by the manufacturers, and those used by the operating system to measure capacity. perhaps this text should be located somewhere more visible.