The playing field is level among manufacturers because nearly all of them use the same practice, but it requires the consumer to be aware of it when looking for a device of a particular actual capacity. The packaging's fine print also indicates 'Actual user storage less', which explains the difference between the calculated 119GB and actual 118GB. Computer operating systems will use the more correct technical values when calculating sizes. The fine print on the packaging indicates this.
Virtually every storage device manufacturer defines 1KB=1000 bytes, 1MB=1,000,000 bytes, and 1GB=1,000,000,000 bytes.
