Question

What is the length of a bit in a channel with a propagation speed 2x108 m/s, if the channel bandwidth is (a)10 mbps (b)100 mbps (c) 1 gbps

Answer 1

Bit length is the distance (in meters) the bit occupies on a transmission medium.

$bit \ \ length=\frac{propagation \ \ speed}{bandwidth}$

This equation is very similar to distance = velocity*time. As the bit length is the distance, the propagation speed is the velocity and the bandwidth is the maximum rate at which bits travel in a certain path (bandwidth = 1/time).

a) $bit \ \ length=\frac{2*10^{8}}{10*10^{6}}$=20m.

b) $bit \ \ length=\frac{2*10^{8}}{100*10^{6}}$=2m.

c) $bit \ \ length=\frac{2*10^{8}}{1*10^{9}}$=0.2m.