Because Obviously I'm Lying

[EclipseDragon986]

I'm really looking forward to waiting tables again. At least I get paid a lot more to put up with stupid people.

His nationality comes into play here, because of what the customer says. And I swear I'm not making this up.

C: Excuse me, I need a hard drive.

M: Ok...*show him the hard drive aisle* What kind of hard drive does your computer use?

C: IDE I think...

M: Ok, well here are some IDE hard drives

C: But I don't want IDE.

M: *blink* Excuse me?

C: I don't want IDE. It messed up my motherboard.

M: Um, you really don't have a choice. IDE is the only thing that will work unless you do additional parts.

C: You don't understand, I know technology because I am Japanese.

M: Um, ok...regardless, IDE is the only thing that can go in your computer.

C: But it fried my motherboard!

M: It's very unlikely that it fries your motherboard if it's the only connection you can use. The only real reason that I can see is if you installed it improperly.

C: I am Japanese! I know technology, of course I did it right!

M: *trying to cut and run, knowing this is about to take a nasty turn* Well, regardless, you can only use IDE.

C: I have another question. How come I don't get all 320 gigabytes? I only get 300?

M: Well some of the space is used internally and you can't have access to it. Some of it is a delete partition, some of it is formatting...

C: But I want to put on XP.

M: And that matters why?

C: Because if I put on XP and use an adapter, I will get the full capacity. The manual says so.

M: I've been building computers for fifteen years now

C: *interrupts* But you are American. I am Japanese, I know technology.

M: *making a supreme effort to hold on my temper* And your operating system doesn't matter. You will never get that full capacity.

C: But I don't understand. If I pay for 320 gigs how come I don't get it?

M: Because some of it is used for a delete partition, some of it used for formatting...

C: I understand what you are saying. But why do I not get the full capacity? I want 320 gigs if I buy 320 gigs.

M: *on the verge of beating my head bloody with the damn hard drive* Because some of it is taken by the delete partition, the formatting...

Coworker: *passing by* What's going on?

C: I want to know why I don't get the full capacity I paid for.

M: *rather muffled because I've got my face buried in my hands* And I've told you three times now.

CW: *looks at me, then at the customer, he's actually certified as a tech* Well it's formatting most of it, so the computer knows what it is, different companies use different amounts.

C: But there must be a way to do it, I'm Japanese. I understand technology.

M: *gives up and hands him the hard drive* You could be Bill Freaking Gates. You're still not getting that full capacity. It's impossible, we've told you four times why, and you insist that because you're Japanese it'll be magic for you. Well good luck, here's your hard drive. I give up. Do what you want.

[Anakah]

What did he say to that?

[evilviolentj]

M: Well some of the space is used internally and you can't have access to it. Some of it is a delete partition, some of it is formatting...

The second I heard this from you is the second I would have walked away.
You don't get the full amount on a hard drive because of 2 different number standards. HDD manufactures report 1 gig as 1,000,000,000 bytes and Windows lists one gig as 1,073,741,824 bytes. The difference is why you 'lose' space on a hard drive. Not because because of formating or some mysterious delete partition.

[IT Grunt]

Not because because of formating or some mysterious delete partition.

Actually, that does play into it. What he is saying is correct. If you could see the tracks and sectors that are created on the disk when a format is done, they take up physical space on the drive. Not a great deal, but it does reduce the amount of actual space the drive contains once an operating system formats it. Without those tracks and sectors created on the drive, the operating system has no means with which to index and locate data. Therefore, a small amount of disk surface usable for storing data has been lost.

I wish I still had it, but I used to have a can of a compound that when you poured it onto a formatted disk (obviously one you didn't want to keep. ), you could see the tracks and sectors created by the format process appear. Pretty much it was just finely ground iron particles suspended in alcohol. They attracted to the sectors and tracks, the alcohol evaporated, leaving you a clear picture of how the drive was formatted. Useful in the old days for ensuring that a disk drive or tape drive was properly formatting, but these days the tracks and sectors are so dense they'd be impossible to see.

[South Texan]

C: You don't understand, I know technology because I am Japanese.

Gee, I guess that means because I am from Texas, I know all about oil drilling and cattle ranching.

[Polenicus]

"You don't get the full 320 gigs because you badmouthed IDE. Now IDE doesn't like you and is holding out. He told his buddies SCSI and Firewire too, so they'll hold out on you too. What I suggest is using some stronger persuasion. Buy this drive and take it outside, and start beating it with a baseball bat. You want this to be public so the other drives know who's boss. Scream at it to give you your 20 gigs. Now, just this one drive won't be enough... go to your workplace and take the drives out of the machines there too, and do the same thing with them. Once they know you mean business and are Japanese, they'll wise up. Once you reinstall them, you should get all the storage space you have coming to you."

[Emrld]

This site has some of the most creative people I have ever come across . . .
Polenicus - your idea was fantastic . . .the scary thing I have come across some people who would believe that to be true.

I am not a hardware person at all . . . so I wouldn't be buying parts for a computer. However I suggest when explaining why they don't get all the information they are paying for and while listening their eyes start to glaze over . . . tell them it is the man's way of sticking it to them.

[lordlundar]

Yeah, it's a combination of the reasons.

Manufacturers report in base 10 (so 1 kb is 1000 bytes) but a computer reads it at base 2 (1kb=1024 bytes) for simplicity sakes they say (*cough*bs).

As well, when a HD is formatted, the table for the format type is created for reference purposes, which is stored on the drive itself.

Finally, when partitioning, sometimes a small partition is created which is dead space to act as a buffer.


And to be perfectly honest, when he asked that, I probably would have said "you're Japanese, you tell me why if you're so knowledgeable in technology."

[Aldous]

"See here, you may be Japanese, but I'm from New Jersey, capisce? Now see, this is whatcha do. First, you give me the hard drive, then I give the hard drive to Vinny, see? After that, the both of us, we "take care" of your little problem. Your hard drive, won't ever think of not giving you the full respect you deserve, and the full memory you paid for. Now about payment."

[Becks]

Aldous, is Vito no longer part of your crew?

[Bliss]

"You don't get the full 320 gigs because you badmouthed IDE. Now IDE doesn't like you and is holding out. "

You polenicus, take my cookie today. I laughed hard and loud at that for a long while.

[protege]

C: *interrupts* But you are American. I am Japanese, I know technology.

I find that amusing...he "knows technology," yet can't figure out why he's not getting the "full amount" of space

[solemnwarning]

Where do people get the idea that the "lost space" of a drive is somthing do do with the partition table or filesystem(s)? The partition table is tiny since it's still the anchient DOS partition table type and most filesystems take trivial amounts of space....

EDIT: I really wish OS developers would stop using kibi,mibi and gibibytes, why not switch to a sane system like kilo,mega and giga?
The "gigabytes" counted in base-2 are infact gibibytes, counted like that for no actual reason other then it's the tradition, another looming monster from people who measure with imperial

[IT Grunt]

Where do people get the idea that the "lost space" of a drive is somthing do do with the partition table or filesystem(s)? The partition table is tiny since it's still the anchient DOS partition table type and most filesystems take trivial amounts of space....

Look at my previous post for the answer. It's not just the file system, it's the actual sectors and tracks that are created when the disk is formatted by the operating system. You may not think it takes a lot, but it uses a good bit of the disk surface to create the sectors and tracks, and this is an area of the disk where data can not be stored. That translates to lost space. When a manufacturer puts on a hard drive '320 GB', that is 320 GB of raw, unformatted capacity. When the drive is formatted so that the operating system can create its filesystem and store data to the drive, part of that raw capacity is used to create the disk structure. This is why the amount of disk space a formatted drive has varies from one operating system to the next. Each one uses its own scheme for creating the disk structure.

[Jadedcarguy]

The second I heard this from you is the second I would have walked away.

Well that was f-in' rude.