Size reports have differences...

ramyzenda

Honorable
Nov 11, 2012
43
0
10,530
I have a 1 TB hard drive that consists of one NTFS partition which I use to back up my data (no operating system). The size of all the data in it is : 726 GB, size on disk: 728 GB, and the used space when I check the properties is: 731 GB. There's a 5 GB or 3 GB difference between the size and the used space.

Why's the difference so huge (5 GB) ??

What's the difference between these sizes? (size, size on disk, and used space)

Is there a way to calculate the difference, and be sure the HDD is not messing around?

Is that normal?
 

velosteraptor

Honorable
Jul 20, 2012
333
0
10,810
^ HDD manufacturers measure 1000 megabytes to be 1 gigabyte, where as an operating system sees 1024 megabytes to be 1 gigabyte. This is why they are different numbers, although actually the same.. Its normal.