


Gigabytes, terabytes and petabytes in computing Here are some other common random words which include metric prefix words, which are interesting discussion points if you seek to explore numbers yourself, or especially if you are attempting to make the subject appealing and accessible to young people or trainees of others sorts. about a billion passed while you are reading this sentence. How quick is a nanosecond? A blink of an eye?Ī bit quicker. a microgram is actually just one-millionth of a gram. How heavy is a microgram? Could you feel a microgram in the palm of your hand?

The metric prefixes help us to appreciate measurements and sizes much more accurately: for example: (10 to the power of three is ten multiplied by itself three times = 1,000. In the metric prefixes table below, 'Factor' equates to the ten-times factor the positive ones represent the number of zeros after the figure the negatives show the number of decimal places after the decimal point. Knowing the actual values of the metric prefixes enables us to have a better understanding of the terms which use them, and the real size of things that are described by them. The metric prefixes have entered many parts of our language and terminology, especially measurements and performance data of very big and very small things (gigabyte, microgram, nanosecond, etc). Metric prefixes: definitions, values and symbols
