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ok....now this could sound a bit too lame but guys i'm really losing my head..
............... the speed i get on my 64Kbps connection is 6-8 Kb/sec for a p2p
or any non p2p download ....does this KB/sec represent kilo bits per sec.......or......kilobytes per second........acc to me it must be kilobytes per sec......what do u think.....i can download a 5 mb file in round 11 mins.

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KB=Kilobytes

Kb=Kilobits

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lemmie see now..

first the subject:
Kbps and KB/sec
Kbps = KB/sec this is the same

next.. the meat and potatoes..
6-8 Kb/sec = estimated/calculated/approximated download speed..
translates to 6Kb*60 seconds = 360Kb/min (roughly 33% or 1/3 MB)

1 MB = 1024 KB = 1.048.576 bytes
5 MB = 5120 KB = 5.242.880 bytes
1 min = 60 sec = 1/60 hr
11 min = 660 sec = 11/60 hr

5.242.880 bytes / 660 sec = 7943.7575757575757575 b/sec

convert to kilobytes..
7943.757575757575757575 bytes / 1024 = 7.757575 Kb in one second

so your estimate of 6-8Kb/sec is right on and 11 minutes is about right.

synopsis:

1TB = 1024GB = 1.048.576MB = 1.073.741.824KB = 1.099.511.627.776 bytes.. not bits
thats next..

any of the above TB, GB, MB, KB, bytes etc.. etc.. multiplied by an amount of time
equals amount/time e.g. : Kb/sec or b/sec

now for bits vs bytes..
8 bits to 1 byte

the letter 'A' in ascii is represented as a binary value of '01000001' <see all 8 bits?
so the letter 'A' = 1 byte or 8bits

There are a million variables that can affect download speed, knowing this isnt one of them.

"Drink your milk, stay in school.."

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That about says it all, just curious, where are you getting the 6-8 K bytes per second report from? It's pretty much standard that these speeds be reported in bits per second. Try the speed test from dslreports.com, it will report it in kbps as it should be.

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lemmie see now..

first the subject:
Kbps and KB/sec
Kbps = KB/sec this is the same

next.. the meat and potatoes..
6-8 Kb/sec = estimated/calculated/approximated download speed..
translates to 6Kb*60 seconds = 360Kb/min (roughly 33% or 1/3 MB)

1 MB = 1024 KB = 1.048.576 bytes
5 MB = 5120 KB = 5.242.880 bytes
1 min = 60 sec = 1/60 hr
11 min = 660 sec = 11/60 hr

5.242.880 bytes / 660 sec = 7943.7575757575757575 b/sec

convert to kilobytes..
7943.757575757575757575 bytes / 1024 = 7.757575 Kb in one second

so your estimate of 6-8Kb/sec is right on and 11 minutes is about right.

synopsis:

1TB = 1024GB = 1.048.576MB = 1.073.741.824KB = 1.099.511.627.776 bytes.. not bits
thats next..

any of the above TB, GB, MB, KB, bytes etc.. etc.. multiplied by an amount of time
equals amount/time e.g. : Kb/sec or b/sec

now for bits vs bytes..
8 bits to 1 byte

the letter 'A' in ascii is represented as a binary value of '01000001' <see all 8 bits?
so the letter 'A' = 1 byte or 8bits

There are a million variables that can affect download speed, knowing this isnt one of them.

"Drink your milk, stay in school.."

However,.. kilobytes KB is used to refer to data 'size' and bits is used to refer
to data rate or speed. and although similar I hear tale that they're NoT at all
the same.. ..so in light of this depending on which gig-e junkie you talk to...
..some say same & others say not.. some say theyre not sure.

I did find a page that left me worse off than when I started..
maybe if I had more ambition then I could sort the semantics out..
heres the link. I think I got the math right and the semantics wrong..
yall decide. I just couldnt let this ride as is.

http://whatis.techtarget.com/definition/0,,sid9_gci499008,00.html
http://searchdomino.techtarget.com/gDefinition/0,294236,sid4_gci499008,00.htm

or in german.. Ich habt nine ida

http://www.uni-koeln.de/rrzk/kompass/69/wmwork/www/k69_17.html

haha happy hunting.. I followed the german one best ..damn

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The convention to use bits per second is due to the fact that a bit was originally the single smallest signaling element included in an electrical exchange and was originally refered to as baud rate. So 300 baud was 300 bits per second and you can't divide that evenly by 8. Baud rates had nothing to do with the 8 bit per byte convention used to store data. Later they found ways to include multiples of bits in an electrical exchange to increase the data transfer rate, so the number of bits transfered is a multiple of the baud rate. Given this, the same baud rate could now express a wide variety of data exchange rates depending on how many bits are contained in a single electrical exchange so kbps is more meaningful to the user. Point is, bits is correct and bytes is not when expressing data transfer rates.

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I'm a newie on DaniWeb and only a tiny bit techical but enjoy learning from the experts! Boy you guys are good! I actually now understand the difference. But question: "Is the difference not between Kb and KB?" One being bits and the other bytes? Regards George

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That does pretty much say it all but since I STILL can't figure it out I come to you with one qustion.

any of the above TB, GB, MB, KB, bytes etc.. etc.. multiplied by an amount of time
equals amount/time e.g. : Kb/sec or b/sec

If Bit to Kb is an 8-1 ratio I don't understand what this means. The one thing I want ot know is this is all about a measure of time/transfer/bandwith. Another way of measuring. Tell me that I am reading into this too much and that it is really that simple.

Thank you again for the info it was well put.

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If Bit to Kb is an 8-1 ratio I don't understand what this means.

There are 8 bits in a byte. 8 bits to 1 byte.

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90 KB/s (kiloBYTES per second) is around 700 kb/s (kiloBITS per second).

That's a pretty decent, standard speed, depending on where you are. Most ISP's sell on the kb/s rate so it's confusing when you see the KB/s rate.

Here is a table for comparison:
http://www.sunbeach.net/page.cfm?menuID=164

When you spend the big money for a T1, it's not because it's all that fast. In fact, most cable connections are now much faster than a T1. The difference is that T1's are a dedicated link between you and your provider, and are guaranteed to be at 99.9999% uptime. Also, your bandwidth rate is guaranteed (about 1.5MB/s up and down at the same time, or 3mb aggregate) which you can run at 100% capacity at all times if you want. The much cheaper cable or DSL connections are "burstable", which means that your available bandwidth is an approximation depending on how many other people on your network segment are using it at the same time as you and to what extent. Also if you overuse/abuse a burstable connection, you may have to pay more or in some cases your ISP will shut you off.

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Even I found these explanations a little confusing, and some of the information isn't quite right, so I'll make it simple:

KBPS (MBPS,GBPS)= kiloybits (megabits, gigabits) per second, this is used to measure bandwidth in connection speeds in internet connections, network speed, or transfer speed of local storage.

KB/s (MB/s, GB/s)= Kilobytes/Second. This is used to measure downloads BECAUSE the file you're downloading is measured in bytes not bits. This allows you to understand the progress without doing conversion.

1 kilobyte is 8 kilobytes, so if you have a 64kbps you'll be able to download 8 kilobytes per second (today 8mbps = 1mb/s is more relevant).

I just noticed that this was bumped from a VERY old post, but I'm already done typing so I'm going to hit reply...

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i have an wireless internet connection of 2.4M
and i test the download and it .66Mb/s
i want to know the relation and how to calculate the downlaod and the transfer rate

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As previously stated the ratio is 8bits to one Byte. To estimate your connection speed in MB/s take the MBPS speed and divide by 8 (2.4mbps/8=.3mb/s).

.66 is higher than you should be getting, but sometimes you do get better than advertised speed. My home connection is supposed to be 18mbps and I routinely get close to 30.

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Hi it means kilobit per second .
How ever i have 256 Kbps link my speeds are

download 0.24Mbps / 249kbps
upload 0.12Mbps / 139 kbps

a local 256 link shared service speed should be ?

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1 kb/s = 1000 bits per second
1 KB/s = 1024 bytes per second

A Kilobit is one thousand bits. It is used to measure the amount of data transferred per second. Kilobits per second is shortened to kb/s, Kbps or kbps (as opposed to KBps, which is Kilobytes per second. Note the capitalization). The lowercase b is commonly used to denote bits, while the uppercase B is used for bytes.