Why are things still released in zips & rars? reddit / irc ---------------------------------------------------------------------- MuffinMatrix · 2016-08-15 18:42 Why do release groups still put things out as zipped up rar files? Theres no compression gain, you just end up needing 3x the storage space of the original download to get the files out. I just got a season of a show, 12gb. Have to unzip it, so now I have 24gb used up. Each episode is subfoldered and rar'd, so now I have to unrar each episode separately, and now have 36gb used up. Just to download it from the start you need to be able to have a solid 12gb, so zipping rars provides no benefit. With today's massive storage, and internet speeds, whats the practical purpose of this these days? ---------------------------------------------------------------------- [deleted] · 2016-08-15 18:53 A lot of releases come out via news groups which have tiny size maximums for posts. 10mb or so. Also zip is an archive format. They aren't doing it for compression. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- MuffinMatrix · 2016-08-15 19:01 I know its not for compression. But its crazy to me how much wasted effort that all entails. Needing 3x the space of your original download just to access whats in it. Because of outdated methods? If you're going to zip it to put it out easier, why not unrar it first? There was already the step of zipping it. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- LongSpicyCat · 2016-08-15 20:14 Not all countries have that fast of an internet. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- [deleted] · 2016-08-16 05:40 [deleted] ---------------------------------------------------------------------- fps81 · 2016-08-16 10:14 Articles on newsgroups also get killed randomly, and rar supports error correction with par2 files. If you have the par2 file, you can be missing a handful of rar files and still recover all the data. As for why not unrar and then zip, my guess is laziness. The person distributing the file on IRC wants to send a single large file, so they download the rars and just immediately zip them up. Less effort and quality control required. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- aperson · 2016-08-16 13:09 > no compression gain > needing 3x the storage space of the original to get the files out Wut. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- danthemango · 2016-08-16 15:04 They mean hard disk space for the final user. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- aperson · 2016-08-16 15:11 I'm pointing out that they're contradicting themself. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- MuffinMatrix · 2016-08-16 18:37 Raring and zipping gives no real extra compression, its just for ease of packaging multiple files. But to get those files out you need 3x the space... my original zip: 12gb, unzipping it out then adds another 12gb, then unraring it adds yet another 12gb. Each step just adds another 12gb, since the previous step's files are still on your system. zip (12gb) + unzipped rars (12gb) + actual files (12gb) = 36gb Sure, once you get the actual files out, you can delete the zip and the rars, so you're back down to the simple 12gb. But my question is how is this an efficient system?? Torrent files can manage multiple files/folders, so the need to zip isn't required, but I was very surprised, going back to IRC after many years, this system is still a thing. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- BirdPooStu · 2016-09-07 15:46 You are mistaken about this. If you are referring to the file format ".zip", it does indeed offer compression (the LZ77 algorithm and Huffman coding comes to mind), as well as archiving. When you say "ease of packaging multiple files" you are speaking of "archiving", and there is a distinction between archiving and compression. ZIP does both. Further, compression is not solely to save disk space, but to transfer data along channels quicker than would be possible in a raw format. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- MuffinMatrix · 2016-09-08 05:08 Wrong context. When the files inside are already compressed, the outer zip/rar offers little to no extra compression (hence the word 'extra' in my statement). In this context, the only purpose is archiving, putting 1 or more files into a single file. My points: 1) A 12gb movie file, within a zip, within a rar, is STILL 12gb. 2) So there is no (or negligible) compression gain over the source file. 3) RARing a single source file into multiple rar files may have been useful in the days of floppy disks, but when each one is 10-15mb on average now, this doesn't really serve to get around any current limits. As someone posted above, some usenet limits are around 10mb, so multiple files that are 15mb is no more useful than a single 12gb file. 4) Going through the effort of having those multiple RAR files, even if for a legit reason..... just to then zip them all up, is completely redundant and any gain of RARing is now lost. 5) Transfer speed issue: downloading a 12gb single file, or a whole collection of files that together still equal 12gb... still leads to you having to download the same amount, regardless of speed. 6) Undoing all this, to get to the actual file you want, as I said above, requires 2 extra steps compared to just having the original file from the start. And performing each of those steps adds another copy of that 12gb of data, leading to 3 copies of it on your drive. The 1st two (the zip, and all the RARs), are now useless and will just be deleted. Download file (12gb), unzip (which leads to a 2nd copy of that data + original = 24gb taken up now), unrar (a 3rd copy is now made, the actual file you wanted + the rars + the zip = 36gb taken up). So I start with a 12gb file, create (out of nowhere essentially) 2 extra versions of it, then delete 2 of the 3. HOW IS THIS EFFICIENT OR USEFUL IN ANY WAY?? Laziness/apathy for end users, that seems to be the only answer that makes any sense. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- BirdPooStu · 2016-09-08 06:07 Ya, I think I misunderstood the context, sorry. sorry.zip.rar