AE2 storage cell calculator

Tell the calculator how many different items (or fluids) you want to store and roughly how many of each. It shows how many cells of each size you need, how many ME Drives that fills and how much idle power they draw, and highlights the size that needs the fewest cells.

How cells count bytes

A cell has a fixed number of bytes: 1,024 in a 1k cell, 4,096 in a 4k and so on up to 262,144 in a 256k. Every different item stored costs a flat block of bytes before any are stored (8 in a 1k cell, 32 in a 4k, 128 in a 16k, 512 in a 64k, 2,048 in a 256k), then each byte holds 8 items, or 8 buckets of a fluid. An item cell takes at most 63 types and a fluid cell 18.

That makes small cells good for many types of a few items each and big cells good for a few types in bulk: a 1k cell fills its 63 type slots with 504 bytes and still holds 4,160 items, while a single type in a 256k cell can reach 2,080,768 items. An ME Drive holds 10 cells; every cell also draws idle power (0.5 AE/t for a 1k up to 2.5 AE/t for a 256k).