Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!ut-emx!ccwf.cc.utexas.edu From: awessels@ccwf.cc.utexas.edu (Allen Wessels) Newsgroups: comp.sys.mac.misc Subject: Re: 24-bit color Message-ID: <40808@ut-emx.uucp> Date: 6 Dec 90 19:59:35 GMT References: <16343@cbmvax.commodore.com> Sender: news@ut-emx.uucp Reply-To: awessels@ccwf.cc.utexas.edu (Allen Wessels) Organization: The University of Texas at Austin Lines: 18 In article <16343@cbmvax.commodore.com> hood@cbmvax.commodore.com (Scott Hood) writes: >Are you assuming that the system in question has had it's video memory >expanded to several megabytes? I thought that the Apple 8*24 card only >had enough standard memory to display 256 colors out of the 24-bit >palette on the screen at once. Am I missing something? It is very nice >indeed that once you have spent more money upgrading the video memory of >the display device that you can display and seriously use as many colors >as you have pixels out of the full 24-bit palette. Just do the math. On a 640*480 screen, 3 bytes per pixel to get 24 bits will require around 900k of memory. The 8*24 comes equipped to handle 256 colors and is expandible to handle 16.7 million. I don't know where you get your "several megabytes" number. 1024*768*3 requires somewhere around 2.35 million bytes, and 32 bit would take about 3 million. (I dunno if the alpha channel would be manipulated in the video memory - prolly would.) 24 bit color is very nice though, as you point out.