Basic Storage Terminologies
Bit:
Bit is the least form of data representation. In the computer terminology bit if regarded as storing either 0 or 1. 0 indicates off and 1 indicates on state. The beauty of this is the system understands and interprets only the bits, so it forms the basis for the computer operation. In programming bits are connected with the data types.
Example:
11100011
11001111
10101010
11110000
Nibble:
Nibble consists of 4 bits, which is half a byte. It is used for easy data representation. They are mainly used in segregating the bytes into the higher order bits and the lower order bits.
Example:
1111
1010
1100
0011
Byte:
A byte consist of 8 bits, the data types available in any typical programming languages measures its data types in bytes. The 8 bits can be either 0 or 1 nothing else is allowed. 2 bytes consists of 16 bits. In the C programming language character is 1 byte, integer data type is 2 bytes, float is 4 bytes, double is 8 bytes, long is 10 bytes. It follows the ASCII pattern. The modern breed of C languages follows the UNICODE and the range of bytes considerably increased to accommodate more values.
Example:
00000101
Kilo Byte:
Files and directories are measured in the Kilo Bytes precisely (KB). A KB consists of 1024 bits. As the data and storage area increased the bits does not accommodate everything so we go for Kilo Bytes.
Example:
5 Kilo Bytes
2 Kilo Bytes
Mega Byte:
Mega Byte is the next largest term after the Kilo Bytes. As 1024 bits consists a Kilo Byte, 1024 Kilo Bytes makes a Mega Byte shortly called as Mega Byte. Now days the Broadband Internet connection speeds are measured in MBPS (Mega Bytes per Second), Compact disks are measured in Mega Bytes (700 MB).
Giga Byte:
Giga Byte is the leading term used in this modern era. It is used for a large storage space. 1024 Mega Bytes makes a Giga Byte. It is used for DVD (Digital Versatile Disk) typically it is around 4.7 GB.
Tara Byte:
Tara Bytes are used in the servers to measure the hard disk spaces. Typically a Tara byte contains 1024 Giga Bytes.
Pita Byte:
Pita Byte, it has the higher range in the modern era. It needs 1024 Tara Bytes to make a Pita Byte. This term is not widely used as it is more costly and expensive.
All the above are the basic storage terms used in the Information Technology. Really everything has become the bits and bytes now a day.
