Calculating wireless transmission rates and file sizes of voltage signals

How much bandwidth and storage space do you need when receiving and recording signals to file?

Introduction

Incoming!

Bits, Bytes and Binary: when 11 = 3

Photo by Markus Spiske on Unsplash

Data Packages

// 250 300 340 translates to the following bytes: 
// 00000000 11111010 00000001 00101100 00000001 01010100
// Suppose the third byte is lost in transmission:
// 00000000 11111010 00101100 00000001 01010100
// Now parsing every 2 bytes (expecting a perfect signal)
// produces the wrong decimal values:
// 250 11265 84
// (or the app might crash at the end of the series because it expects one more byte)

Calculate the wireless throughput

8 bytes/package * 10 packages/second = 80 bytes per second
80 bytes/s * 8 bits/byte = 640 bps

Aside: Internet speeds

Photo by rawpixel on Unsplash
100 Mbps / 8b = only 12.5 Megabytes per second!

Outgoing! (File Storage)

timestamp,sensorA,sensorB,sensorC
1548115722,765,427,904
1548115723,780,423,915
1548115724,779,421,920
...etc...

UTF-8 encoding

Calculating text file size

Transferring the file elsewhere

23 bytes/package * 10 packages/sec * 60 sec/min * 60 min/hour * 8 hours + 34 bytes/header = 6,624,034 bytes

Conclusion

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Physician in Spinal Cord Injury & Physical Medicine and Rehab @ Rocky Mountain Regional VAMC, Colorado. Interests: Rehab Engineering & software development

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George Marzloff

Physician in Spinal Cord Injury & Physical Medicine and Rehab @ Rocky Mountain Regional VAMC, Colorado. Interests: Rehab Engineering & software development