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The Basics of the Binary Code
The basics of the binary code
• It all starts with 1’s and 0’s (binary code)
• A bit is either a “1” or a “0”
• A byte is a sequence of bits, usually 8 bits.
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• A “bit” is denoted by a lower case “b” while a “byte” is denoted by an upper case “B”.
• The speed of a communication link is typically measured in bits per second (bps).
• The size of a data file is typically measured in bytes.
• Confusion – If a 3 MB file is sent over a 3 Mbps communication line, it doesn’t take one second, it actually would take around 8 seconds.
Kilobyte - 1,000 Bytes
Megabyte - 1,000,000 Bytes
Gigabyte - 1,000,000,000 Bytes
Terabyte - 1,000,000,000,000 Bytes
Interesting Facts
• A standard MP3 music file is @ 3 to 4 MB
• A 2 hour movie is @ 1.5 GB (1,500 MB)
• A 10 minute HD YouTube video can be over 1GB (1,000 MB)
• A HD ITV class streams at 1,472Kbps (1.5Mbps)
Scary Fact
• If you have a 15Mbps internet connection, and you can attain 100% throughput, downloading or streaming a 10 minute HD YouTube video would take approximately 9 minutes! And that is not allowing any additional internet traffic.
The calculation
The maximum bandwidth for your school district is 15Mbps - 15,000,000 bits/second. To convert it to Bytes per second you have to divide it by 8.
15,000,000 bits/second = 1,875,000 Bytes per second maximum download speed
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If someone is going to download a 1GB file (1,000,000,000 bytes) you have to divide the file size by the maximum download speed of you bandwidth, in Bytes.
1,000,000,000 Bytes = 533 seconds
1,875,000 Bytes/second
533 seconds mathematically translates into 8.88 minutes.