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I always wondered what KiB MiB GiB in certain programs meant, I just looked it up on ACronymFinder and found these results:
Kib Kibibit (2^10 Bits)
KiB Kibibyte (2^10 Bytes)
Mib Mebibit (2^20 Bits)
MiB Mebibyte (2^20 bytes)
Gib Gibibit (2^30 Bits)
GiB Gibibyte (2^30 Bytes)
What the heck are these? How are they different from the __lo___ (kiLObyte) versions of the words instead of these __bi___ (kiBIbyte) versions? They sure sound funny though :D
A google search found this:
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kibibyte (a contraction of kilo binary byte) is a unit of information or computer storage, commonly abbreviated KiB (never "kiB").
1 kibibyte = 210 bytes = 1,024 bytes
The kibibyte is closely related to the kilobyte, which can be used either as a synonym for kibibyte or to refer to 103 bytes = 1,000 bytes (see binary prefix).
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If the above weren't weird enough, how are these? :D
terabit Tbit 1012 (or 240) tebibit Tibit 240
petabit Pbit 1015 (or 250) pebibit Pibit 250
exabit Ebit 1018 (or 260) exbibit Eibit 260
zettabit Zbit 1021 (or 270)
yottabit Ybit 1024 (or 280)
Yep, all to do with the confusion caused by terms like "kilo" being used for both powers of ten and powers of two. In the parts of the world where the metric (SI) standards are used, these terms must officially be used to describe powers of ten. So the "power of 2" quantities described by computer terminology must use different prefixes, so e.g. you end up with mebibytes - (mega binary bytes).
01110011 01110100 01101111 01110000 01101001 01110100 01101111 01100110 01100110 ! :p