Extreme Graphics is a

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 de ...

architecture for

Silicon Graphics Silicon Graphics, Inc. (stylized as SiliconGraphics before 1999, later rebranded SGI, historically known as Silicon Graphics Computer Systems or SGCS) was an American high-performance computing manufacturer, producing computer hardware and soft ...

computer workstation A workstation is a special computer designed for technical or scientific applications. Intended primarily to be used by a single user, they are commonly connected to a local area network and run multi-user operating systems. The term ''workstat ...

s. Extreme Graphics was developed in 1993 and was available as a high-end graphics option on workstations such as the

Indigo2 The O2 is a large entertainment district on the Greenwich peninsula in South East London, England, including an indoor arena, a music club, a Cineworld cinema, an exhibition space, piazzas, bars, and restaurants. It was built largely within ...

, released during the mid-1990s. Extreme Graphics gives the workstation real-time 2D and

3D graphics 3D computer graphics, or “3D graphics,” sometimes called CGI, 3D-CGI or three-dimensional computer graphics are graphics that use a three-dimensional representation of geometric data (often Cartesian) that is stored in the computer for the ...

rendering capability similar to that of even high-end PCs made many years after Extreme's introduction, with the exception of texture rendering which is performed in

software Software is a set of computer programs and associated documentation and data. This is in contrast to hardware, from which the system is built and which actually performs the work. At the lowest programming level, executable code consists ...

. Extreme Graphics systems consist of eight

Geometry Engine Geometric manipulation of modelling primitives, such as that performed by a geometry pipeline, is the first stage in computer graphics systems which perform image generation based on geometric models. While geometry pipelines were originally implem ...

s and two

Raster Engine Raster may refer to: * Raster graphics, graphical techniques using arrays of pixel values * Raster graphics editor, a computer program * Raster scan, the pattern of image readout, transmission, storage, and reconstruction in television and comput ...

s, twice as many units as the Elan/XZ graphics used in the

Indy Indy may refer to: Computing and technology *Indy (software), used for Internet access to music *Internet Direct, or "Indy", a software library *SGI Indy, a computer workstation Periodicals *''The Indy'', shorthand for newspapers that include " ...

Indigo Indigo is a deep color close to the color wheel blue (a primary color in the RGB color space), as well as to some variants of ultramarine, based on the ancient dye of the same name. The word "indigo" comes from the Latin word ''indicum'', m ...

, and

. The eight geometry engines are rated at 256 MFLOPS maximum, far faster than the MIPS R4400 CPU used in the workstation. Extreme Graphics consists of five graphics subsystems: the Command Engine, Geometry Subsystem, Raster Engine,

framebuffer 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 ...

and Display Subsystem

Extreme Graphics can produce resolutions up to 1280 x 1024 pixels with 24-bit color and can also process unencoded

NTSC The first American standard for analog television broadcast was developed by National Television System Committee (NTSC)National Television System Committee (1951–1953), Report and Reports of Panel No. 11, 11-A, 12–19, with Some supplement ...

and

PAL Phase Alternating Line (PAL) is a colour encoding system for analogue television. It was one of three major analogue colour television standards, the others being NTSC and SECAM. In most countries it was broadcast at 625 lines, 50 fields (25 ...

analog

television Television, sometimes shortened to TV, is a telecommunication medium for transmitting moving images and sound. The term can refer to a television set, or the medium of television transmission. Television is a mass medium for advertisin ...

signals. It is reported by the PROM as GU1-Extreme. The Extreme Graphics architecture was superseded by SGI's

IMPACT Impact may refer to: * Impact (mechanics), a high force or shock (mechanics) over a short time period * Impact, Texas, a town in Taylor County, Texas, US Science and technology * Impact crater, a meteor crater caused by an impact event * Impact ...

graphics architecture in 1995.

External links

Indigo2 and POWER Indigo2 Technical Report
{{Silicon Graphics Graphics chips SGI graphics