How fast is 464 kbps?

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BlitzPuppet

Platinum Member
Feb 4, 2012
2,460
7
81
Dumb question: Why still 8 bits in a byte in a 64-bit world?

Not sure I understand the question? It's a base measurement that everything is based off of. It's like changing the value of a pound or kilo, wouldn't make sense to do either.

Just because we are on 32, 64, or 128bit systems doesn't change the fact that there are 8 bits in a byte.
 

JujuFish

Lifer
Feb 3, 2005
11,356
1,008
136
By the way: kilo is a lower case k as well, an upper case K would be Kelvin in most cases.
Also, it's whether or not the 'b' is capitalized that indicates bits or bytes. Kilobits is kb, kilobytes is kB.
 

_Rick_

Diamond Member
Apr 20, 2012
3,948
70
91
Dumb question: Why still 8 bits in a byte in a 64-bit world?

Because independently of word lengths, the Byte remained the minimally adressable unit in many contexts. Though with HDD sectors being 512/4096 bits and memory also being read in larger bursts, the Byte really holds no more meaning with regards to most things, except for example encoding the per-color information in a 24/32 bpp bitmap, or as a soft delimiter to indiciate where a binary file ends - but then even those should realistically end on word-length-multiples, but text-headers or the like can extend this, and compression can also make use of Byte- and below sized information.

The Byte then, is mostly a legacy unit. But not completely!
 

Imp

Lifer
Feb 8, 2000
18,828
184
106
You people saying 0.464 Mbps are crazy. Learn to peddle: it's 0.5 Mbps.

I think that's what my 100 year old phone lines top out at on DSL.
 

Murloc

Diamond Member
Jun 24, 2008
5,382
65
91
I prefer to use mbps vs Mbps, that way you know it was not a typo since you could mess up the b :awe:
it could create confusion if someone did not know that you cannot divide a bit.

m means milli, M means mega.

SI_prefixes.jpg
 
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Red Squirrel

No Lifer
May 24, 2003
69,785
13,370
126
www.anyf.ca
Ping would be awful. 56k would be better for some applications.

Yeah latency is probably more important than speed in some cases. But the most important factor of all is not even technical, and it's whether or not they cap it. I'd rather have unlimited dialup than limited high speed. Thankfully I have the best of both worlds, unlimited fibre to the home. 50/30 FTW. I consider myself very lucky to get this as most people here in Canada don't have access to such fast connection and not everyone who does has an uncapped one.
 

lxskllr

No Lifer
Nov 30, 2004
59,137
9,581
126
I'd rather have unlimited dialup than limited high speed.
I used to get disconnected after 12 hours exactly. I might as well have been speaking Navajo calling cs. No one knew what I was talking about, and denied disconnecting me. Dialup was the only reason I had a landline, but I was limited to ~250MB before my download failed. That's where torrents really shine. They're extremely fault tolerant. I ended up ditching 56k in 2006(relatively late) due to Verizon jerking me around on a repair issue. They were claiming the fault was my wiring(means *I* have to pay), and not them. I just dropped the whole thing and got Comcast. There's fios around here now, but Verizon can go fuck themselves. Unless Comcast screws up bad, and they haven't, the only use I have for Verizon is potential leverage against Comcast in case I need it.
 

BUTCH1

Lifer
Jul 15, 2000
20,433
1,769
126
That's about the equivalent of the cheapest DSL plan you can buy, ATOT will probably be fine, video streaming will have to be at the lowest offered resolution. I would not recommend this Old's, if you've had a decent high speed connection for a long time this will suck donkey's balls for you. Think of downgrading from a '69 Camaro SS 396 to a Ford Falcon. Yea, that bad.
 

Red Squirrel

No Lifer
May 24, 2003
69,785
13,370
126
www.anyf.ca
I used to get disconnected after 12 hours exactly. I might as well have been speaking Navajo calling cs. No one knew what I was talking about, and denied disconnecting me. Dialup was the only reason I had a landline, but I was limited to ~250MB before my download failed. That's where torrents really shine. They're extremely fault tolerant. I ended up ditching 56k in 2006(relatively late) due to Verizon jerking me around on a repair issue. They were claiming the fault was my wiring(means *I* have to pay), and not them. I just dropped the whole thing and got Comcast. There's fios around here now, but Verizon can go fuck themselves. Unless Comcast screws up bad, and they haven't, the only use I have for Verizon is potential leverage against Comcast in case I need it.

I remember before torrents, think it was either Kazzaa or Morpheus I was using, with dialup. I actually managed to download a 600MB file in 2 weeks on and off. I was very surprised that the file was not even corrupt.

Today we tend to take always-on internet for granted. I used to get DCed all the time too with dialup. Hear the relay in the modem click off and know exactly what happened before even getting an error. Then my mom would happen to pickup the phone and I was out for at least a few hours before I can connect again. :biggrin:
 

BUTCH1

Lifer
Jul 15, 2000
20,433
1,769
126
I used to get disconnected after 12 hours exactly. I might as well have been speaking Navajo calling cs. No one knew what I was talking about, and denied disconnecting me. Dialup was the only reason I had a landline, but I was limited to ~250MB before my download failed. That's where torrents really shine. They're extremely fault tolerant. I ended up ditching 56k in 2006(relatively late) due to Verizon jerking me around on a repair issue. They were claiming the fault was my wiring(means *I* have to pay), and not them. I just dropped the whole thing and got Comcast. There's fios around here now, but Verizon can go fuck themselves. Unless Comcast screws up bad, and they haven't, the only use I have for Verizon is potential leverage against Comcast in case I need it.

Wow, hard to believe anyone was using dial-up in 2006, that must have been horrific.
 

BUTCH1

Lifer
Jul 15, 2000
20,433
1,769
126
I rarely got that. usually connected at 53 or 33.6.

I really don't miss dial up days.

Unless you had AOL which would give you the "goodbye!" as it kicked users off during peak hours. When I called to complain I was offered a speedy auto-dialer so I could re-connect fast before I got booted again. I switched to Earthlink shortly thereafter.
 

lxskllr

No Lifer
Nov 30, 2004
59,137
9,581
126
Wow, hard to believe anyone was using dial-up in 2006, that must have been horrific.

It wasn't so bad. The worst was getting auto disconnected. Otherwise, I'm patient, and I could play UT2k4 on that connection. I doubt I could go back though. For the most part, the web's gotten too fat for dialup.
 

waggy

No Lifer
Dec 14, 2000
68,143
10
81
Unless you had AOL which would give you the "goodbye!" as it kicked users off during peak hours. When I called to complain I was offered a speedy auto-dialer so I could re-connect fast before I got booted again. I switched to Earthlink shortly thereafter.

I had AOL for a very short time. I was lucky in finding a local company that was pretty damn good.
 

ninaholic37

Golden Member
Apr 13, 2012
1,883
31
91
I rarely got that. usually connected at 53 or 33.6.

I really don't miss dial up days.
Yes, I remember only being able to download at 4.something kB/s on dialup with a 56kbps modem, never higher. Didn't know at the time that 56kbps really meant 7kB or whatever sneaky capitalization nonsense it was, but still it was always only 4.something, don't remember why (something about how phone lines work ?).
 

lxskllr

No Lifer
Nov 30, 2004
59,137
9,581
126
Yes, I remember only being able to download at 4.something kB/s on dialup with a 56kbps modem, never higher. Didn't know at the time that 56kbps really meant 7kB or whatever sneaky capitalization nonsense it was, but still it was always only 4.something, don't remember why (something about how phone lines work ?).

Your connection speed was the cap for that session, but it could always go slower. IOW, if you connect at 48KBps, you speed won't go above 6Kbps, but it could be anything 6 or below. If I got a slow connection, I'd disconnect, and try again.
 

olds

Elite Member
Mar 3, 2000
50,101
771
126
That's about the equivalent of the cheapest DSL plan you can buy, ATOT will probably be fine, video streaming will have to be at the lowest offered resolution. I would not recommend this Old's, if you've had a decent high speed connection for a long time this will suck donkey's balls for you. Think of downgrading from a '69 Camaro SS 396 to a Ford Falcon. Yea, that bad.
It's not for me. It's satellite for emergency operations. The dish is about the size of a dinner plate. I have other options though.