[geeks] The topic for the day..

[Shannon Hendrix]

On May 28, 2008, at 12:45 , Lionel Peterson wrote:

> On May 28, 2008, at 11:23 AM, Bill Bradford <mrbill at mrbill.net> wrote:
>
>> Why is computer memory nowdays (at least in the "personal computer"  
>> field)
>> measured in bytes and not words (as I've seen used in the "big iron"
>> field)?
>
> The PC market was defined by techs in the late '70s, and all PCs  
> were 8-bit.
>
> Later on, the marketers were stuck with bytes, as it matched HD  
> capacity and kept things simple. If marketers had their way, I  
> suspect we'd measure RAM in bits (as in my new 8 Tbit HD ;^)...

I think it is just because most common machines can address a byte, so  
they use that in the reported size instead of words.

Also, when the public was first marketed to directly (with memory),  
one byte was one character of information, so it fit nicely.

-- 
"Where some they sell their dreams for small desires."