Download speed now displayed in bits rather than bytes?

[Darth]

As of the latest beta at time of writing (1456797646) the Steam client is displaying download speed in bit-based units rather than byte-based units, and has converted my previous cap setting (256KB/s to 2.0Mbps).

The use of bit-based units doesn't make much sense. It is being combined with byte-based units on the same display which gives a mixed message. "Current" speed and "Peak" speed are being displayed in bits, "Total" downloaded and "Disk usage" speed are in bytes (as are the indications of how big the game is and how much of it has been downloaded).

The only reason I see bit-based being useful is to make people think they're suddenly able to download 8x as fast as they usually can download, giving a placebo of Steam being faster. This won't work, too many Steam users will be aware of the difference between bits and bytes, and those that aren't are just going to be confused by the mix of terminology. ("If I'm downloading at "10Mbps" how come my 100MB download isn't done in 10 seconds??")

Why have bytes been partially replaced by bits?

[Darth]

I appreciate the response and I can understand the theory behind that, but (in Australia for ADSL2 connections at least) the advertised internet speed is a "theoretical peak" that anyone who isn't right next to the exchange does not receive (for example it might be advertised as a "theoretical peak" of 20mbps, but you might get around 5).
On the other hand most people would be familiar with their maximum speed in bytes, due to browser downloads (IE, Chrome, Firefox all use bytes), or a console or gaming service (Steam, Xbox One), and so on.

If an option is made available then that's good for everyone (can use what you are most comfortable/familiar with) but the idea of only having bits (mixed in with other areas displayed in bytes) seems confusing.

[Akaris]

引用自 Taylor Sherman：

Hi everyone,

In the US at least, the speed advertised for connections by Internet Service Providers is usually in bits - for instance 10Mbps. For this reason, it seemed better to change the Steam UI to use the same units. So for instance, if you have a 10Mbps internet connection, and see 7 Mbps being used by Steam, you can very quickly tell if that performance is close to what you'd hope for, and also how much of your connection is free for other traffic.

With the old units, it would have been displayed as 875KB/sec, which is much less intuitive to compare with.

We'll look into adding the option to select which unit is used.

thanks,
Taylor

thats fine for the US but lot of the rest of us use Bytes

as steam is global, you guys should at minimum add user selectable option

shouldnt be a very hard fix, dont be silly, and try to attach the fix to the next update

[Akaris]

引用自 Darthikins Tealcina：

On the other hand most people would be familiar with their maximum speed in bytes, due to browser downloads (IE, Chrome, Firefox all use bytes), or a console or gaming service (Steam, Xbox One), and so on.

also this :)

[Gilder The Squidslinger]

I don't care what the moronic douchebag ISPs use to try and upsell their crap. I want bytes back!

It is not much less intuitive, every browser in existence measures in Bytes. Computers measure storage and speed in BYTES!!! No one uses bits!!

Either change it back or provide a button to choose!!!

Come on Valve, do you really think so little of us? Can't you at least put half an ass into justifying this lunacy?

[RzTen]

I understand showing bits in the bandwidth limiter section, but on the actual download display it makes less sense. Are you going to start listing game file sizes in gigabits?

Plus, bits doesn't account for the actual transmission overhead so it's even less useful. A 20 megabit connection can't actually download at 20 megabits.

[daaw_gees]

引用自 Gilder the Squidslinger：

I don't care what the moronic douchebag ISPs use to try and upsell their crap. I want bytes back!

It is not much less intuitive, every browser in existence measures in Bytes. Computers measure storage and speed in BYTES!!! No one uses bits!!

Either change it back or provide a button to choose!!!

Come on Valve, do you really think so little of us? Can't you at least put half an ass into justifying this lunacy?

Alternatively, perhaps they think highly of you to do the math yourself, regardless of whether they put it in Mbps or MBps. Just a thought.

[Camzie99]

As someone who lives in the UK, ISPs advertise their speeds in Mbps here too and I find it completely deplorable. It's a dirty marketing tactic and there is no usage for Mbps except for marketing purposes. Bytes are far more accepted, especially when it comes to download and upload speeds when you're actually doing anything with a browser or other piece of software with internet capabilities and I believe this change is a step backwards if anything. I personally find this far more difficult to work with than bytes since it requires an extra conversion in order to actually be useful. The whole "comparison between your speed and the ISP's advertised speed" isn't really relevant since one conversion (from their advertised speeds into bytes rather than bits) is useful everywhere in terms of the Internet. Measuring in bits isn't useful, they're not used for storage, they're not used for actual download speeds, they're used in dirty marketing tactics and naught else (at least in my personal experience with the modern Internet). I sincerely hope this change is reverted or an option to change this is implemented in the very least.

[Hoshi]

Bring back the byte display or give us the option to choose.

I was just momentarily baffled that Door Kickers was going to take 4 hours to download before realizing that my download limit was in bits rather than bytes.

[76561198040841481]

AWESOME .. I support this honestly

It slightly bothers me that the 'speed cap' is far lower then it was before. where as 5-6MB/s download would be near the middle, now it's literally 3rd from the bottom, and I know I don't have the fastest net. (50-60Mbps down)

I think the finer control over what I would literally call ...'DSL' level speeds, is ok, but the difference between 1Mbps & 2 Mbps, is ... well still slow. though I am surprised there is Kbps.

Though I support the choice to match the speeds to the metric that most ISPs sell in. It does NOT matter what so ever if your browsers or tools like Netbalancer show MB/s, as they are NOT the ones you are in legal contracts over Internet connection speeds.

Though I think for now having finer controls on DL limits ia good thing for most customers, as not everyone has unlimited data usage.

----

Though to everyone ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ about bits, grow up. Marketing has twisted them to hype for sure, but they have far more practical measuring then bytes, having finer controls for easier viewing & dividing resources. The conversion is simple. 8 bits to 1 byte. The computer uses this constantly but since most systems use such astronomically large numbers of bits, reprosenting them in Bytes makes more sense, over bits.

It's a lame tactic that was in the HDD space for a period of time, but once the 500MB-1GB barrer was crossed, they seemed to drop bits as a marketing ploy.
--TLDR Once speeds start to reach 300MB/s-500MB/s down or throughput on internet speeds, we won't see that switch. even 100MB/s seems to be that threshhold/tipping point where most switch to that larger unit.

[76561198113022682]

?????

[Taylor Sherman]

We've updated things in the latest Beta - it's now optional to display the throughput in bits, but the default is back to bytes. Thanks for the feedback everyone.

The option can be found in the Settings dialog, in the "Downloads" section.

[DIENER]

引用自 Taylor Sherman：

We've updated things in the latest Beta - it's now optional to display the throughput in bits, but the default is back to bytes. Thanks for the feedback everyone.

The option can be found in the Settings dialog, in the "Downloads" section.

Thank you.

[Darth]

Thank you for the update

[The Electrician]

引用自 Taylor Sherman：

We've updated things in the latest Beta - it's now optional to display the throughput in bits, but the default is back to bytes. Thanks for the feedback everyone.

The option can be found in the Settings dialog, in the "Downloads" section.

Thanks for listening!

[Dusk of Oolacile]

引用自 Taylor Sherman：

We've updated things in the latest Beta - it's now optional to display the throughput in bits, but the default is back to bytes. Thanks for the feedback everyone.

The option can be found in the Settings dialog, in the "Downloads" section.

Once you change the setting, it only takes effect after restarting steam. There is no prompt to restart though, so at first sight it seems to do nothing.