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Fillrate
In computer graphics, a video card's pixel fillrate refers to the number of pixels that can be rendered on the screen and written to video memory in one second. Pixel fillrates are given in megapixels per second or in gigapixels per second (in the case of newer cards), and are obtained by multiplying the number of render output units (ROPs) by the clock frequency of the graphics processing unit (GPU) of a video card. A similar concept, texture fillrate, refers to the number of texture map elements ( texels) the GPU can map to pixels in one second. Texture fillrate is obtained by multiplying the number of texture mapping units (TMUs) by the clock frequency of the GPU. Texture fillrates are given in mega or gigatexels per second. However, there is no full agreement on how to calculate and report fillrates. Another possible method is to multiply the number of pixel pipelines by the GPU's clock frequency. The results of these multiplications correspond to a theoretical number. The ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Texture Mapping Unit
In computer graphics, a texture mapping unit (TMU) is a component in modern graphics processing units (GPUs). They are able to rotate, resize, and distort a bitmap image to be placed onto an arbitrary plane of a given 3D model as a texture, in a process called texture mapping. In modern graphics cards it is implemented as a discrete stage in a graphics pipeline, whereas when first introduced it was implemented as a separate processor, e.g. as seen on the Voodoo2 graphics card. Background and history The TMU came about due to the compute demands of sampling and transforming a flat image (as the texture map) to the correct angle and perspective it would need to be in 3D space. The compute operation is a large matrix multiply, which CPUs of the time (early Pentiums) could not cope with at acceptable performance. In 2013, TMUs are part of the shader pipeline and decoupled from the Render Output Pipelines (ROPs). For example, in AMD's Cypress GPU, each shader pipeline (of which th ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Pixel Pipelines
In computer graphics, a computer graphics pipeline, rendering pipeline or simply graphics pipeline, is a conceptual model that describes what steps a graphics system needs to perform to render a 3D scene to a 2D screen. Once a 3D model has been created, for instance in a video game or any other 3D computer animation, the graphics pipeline is the process of turning that 3D model into what the computer displays. Because the steps required for this operation depend on the software and hardware used and the desired display characteristics, there is no universal graphics pipeline suitable for all cases. However, graphics application programming interfaces (APIs) such as Direct3D and OpenGL were created to unify similar steps and to control the graphics pipeline of a given hardware accelerator. These APIs abstract the underlying hardware and keep the programmer away from writing code to manipulate the graphics hardware accelerators (AMD/Intel/NVIDIA etc.). ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Graphics Processing Unit
A graphics processing unit (GPU) is a specialized electronic circuit designed to manipulate and alter memory to accelerate the creation of images in a frame buffer intended for output to a display device. GPUs are used in embedded systems, mobile phones, personal computers, workstations, and game consoles. Modern GPUs are efficient at manipulating computer graphics and image processing. Their parallel structure makes them more efficient than general-purpose central processing units (CPUs) for algorithms that process large blocks of data in parallel. In a personal computer, a GPU can be present on a video card or embedded on the motherboard. In some CPUs, they are embedded on the CPU die. In the 1970s, the term "GPU" originally stood for ''graphics processor unit'' and described a programmable processing unit independently working from the CPU and responsible for graphics manipulation and output. Later, in 1994, Sony used the term (now standing for ''graphics processing unit'' ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Computer Graphics
Computer graphics deals with generating images with the aid of computers. Today, computer graphics is a core technology in digital photography, film, video games, cell phone and computer displays, and many specialized applications. A great deal of specialized hardware and software has been developed, with the displays of most devices being driven by computer graphics hardware. It is a vast and recently developed area of computer science. The phrase was coined in 1960 by computer graphics researchers Verne Hudson and William Fetter of Boeing. It is often abbreviated as CG, or typically in the context of film as computer generated imagery (CGI). The non-artistic aspects of computer graphics are the subject of computer science research. Some topics in computer graphics include user interface design, sprite graphics, rendering, ray tracing, geometry processing, computer animation, vector graphics, 3D modeling, shaders, GPU design, implicit surfaces, visualization, scientific c ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Tom's Hardware
''Tom's Hardware'' is an online publication owned by Future plc and focused on technology. It was founded in 1996 by Thomas Pabst. It provides articles, news, price comparisons, videos and reviews on computer hardware and high technology. The site features coverage on CPUs, motherboards, RAM, PC cases, graphic cards, display technology, power supplies and displays, storage, smartphones, tablets, gaming, consoles, and computer peripherals. ''Tom's Hardware'' has a forum and featured blogs. History ''Tom's Hardware'' was founded in April 1996 as ''Tom's Hardware Guide'' in the United States by Thomas Pabst. It started using the domain tomshardware.com in September 1997 and was followed by several foreign language versions, including Italian, French, Finnish and Russian based on franchise agreements. While the initial testing labs were in Germany and California, much of Tom's Hardware's testing now occurs in New York and a facility in Ogden, Utah owned by its parent company. In ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Window (computing)
In computing, a window is a graphical control element. It consists of a visual area containing some of the graphical user interface of the program it belongs to and is framed by a window decoration. It usually has a rectangular shape that can overlap with the area of other windows. It displays the ''output'' of and may allow ''input'' to one or more processes. Windows are primarily associated with graphical displays, where they can be manipulated with a pointer by employing some kind of pointing device. Text-only displays can also support windowing, as a way to maintain multiple independent display areas, such as multiple buffers in Emacs. Text windows are usually controlled by keyboard, though some also respond to the mouse. A graphical user interface (GUI) using windows as one of its main "metaphors" is called a windowing system, whose main components are the display server and the window manager. History The idea was developed at the Stanford Research Institute (led by D ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Display Resolution
The display resolution or display modes of a digital television, computer monitor or display device is the number of distinct pixels in each dimension that can be displayed. It can be an ambiguous term especially as the displayed resolution is controlled by different factors in cathode ray tube (CRT) displays, flat-panel displays (including liquid-crystal displays) and projection displays using fixed picture-element (pixel) arrays. It is usually quoted as ', with the units in pixels: for example, ' means the width is 1024 pixels and the height is 768 pixels. This example would normally be spoken as "ten twenty-four by seven sixty-eight" or "ten twenty-four by seven six eight". One use of the term ''display resolution'' applies to fixed-pixel-array displays such as plasma display panels (PDP), liquid-crystal displays (LCD), Digital Light Processing (DLP) projectors, OLED displays, and similar technologies, and is simply the physical number of columns and rows of pixels creating ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Frame Rate
Frame rate (expressed in or FPS) is the frequency (rate) at which consecutive images (frames) are captured or displayed. The term applies equally to film and video cameras, computer graphics, and motion capture systems. Frame rate may also be called the , and be expressed in hertz. Frame rate in electronic camera specifications may refer to the maximal possible rate, where, in practice, other settings (such as exposure time) may reduce the frequency to a lower number. Human vision The temporal sensitivity and resolution of human vision varies depending on the type and characteristics of visual stimulus, and it differs between individuals. The human visual system can process 10 to 12 images per second and perceive them individually, while higher rates are perceived as motion. Modulated light (such as a computer display) is perceived as stable by the majority of participants in studies when the rate is higher than 50 Hz. This perception of modulated light as steady is known ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Frame Buffer
A framebuffer (frame buffer, or sometimes framestore) is a portion of random-access memory (RAM) containing a bitmap that drives a video display. It is a memory buffer containing data representing all the pixels in a complete video frame. Modern video cards contain framebuffer circuitry in their cores. This circuitry converts an in-memory bitmap into a video signal that can be displayed on a computer monitor. In computing, a screen buffer is a part of computer memory used by a computer application for the representation of the content to be shown on the computer display. The screen buffer may also be called the video buffer, the regeneration buffer, or regen buffer for short. Screen buffers should be distinguished from video memory. To this end, the term off-screen buffer is also used. The information in the buffer typically consists of color values for every pixel to be shown on the display. Color values are commonly stored in 1-bit binary (monochrome), 4-bit palettized, 8-bit ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Unified Shader
In the field of 3D computer graphics, the unified shader model (known in Direct3D 10 as " Shader Model 4.0") refers to a form of shader hardware in a graphical processing unit (GPU) where all of the shader stages in the rendering pipeline (geometry, vertex, pixel, etc.) have the same capabilities. They can all read textures and buffers, and they use instruction sets that are almost identical. History Earlier GPUs generally included two types of shader hardware, with the ''vertex shaders'' having considerably more instructions than the simpler ''pixel shaders''. This lowered the cost of implementation of the GPU as a whole, and allowed more shaders in total on a single unit. This was at the cost of making the system less flexible, and sometimes leaving one set of shaders idle if the workload used one more than the other. As improvements in fabrication continued, this distinction became less useful. ATI Technologies introduced a unified architecture on the hardware they developed ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
NVIDIA
Nvidia CorporationOfficially written as NVIDIA and stylized in its logo as VIDIA with the lowercase "n" the same height as the uppercase "VIDIA"; formerly stylized as VIDIA with a large italicized lowercase "n" on products from the mid 1990s to early-mid 2000s. Though unofficial, second letter capitalization of NVIDIA, i.e. nVidia, may be found within enthusiast communities and publications. ( ) is an American multinational technology company incorporated in Delaware and based in Santa Clara, California. It is a software and fabless company which designs graphics processing units (GPUs), application programming interface (APIs) for data science and high-performance computing as well as system on a chip units (SoCs) for the mobile computing and automotive market. Nvidia is a global leader in artificial intelligence hardware and software. Its professional line of GPUs are used in workstations for applications in such fields as architecture, engineering and construction, media ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
ATI Technologies
ATI Technologies Inc. (commonly called ATI) was a Canadian semiconductor industry, semiconductor technology corporation based in Markham, Ontario, Markham, Ontario, that specialized in the development of graphics processing units and chipsets. Founded in 1985 as Array Technology Inc., the company listed publicly in 1993. Advanced Micro Devices (AMD) acquired ATI in 2006. As a major fabrication-less or fabless semiconductor company, ATI conducted research and development in-house and outsourcing, outsourced the manufacturing and assembly of its products. With the decline and eventual bankruptcy of 3dfx in 2000, ATI and its chief rival Nvidia emerged as the two dominant players in the graphics processors industry, eventually forcing other manufacturers into niche roles. The acquisition of ATI in 2006 was important to AMD's strategic development of its AMD Fusion, Fusion generation of computer processors, which integrated general processing abilities with graphics processing function ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
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