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From: gerloff@cs.tu-berlin.de (Olaf Gerloff)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.atari.st
Subject: Re: Neophyte question: what's Blitter?
Keywords: Blitter
Message-ID: <684@mailgzrz.tu-berlin.de>
Date: 3 Jun 91 13:48:17 GMT
References: <1991May31.170349.15843@milton.u.washington.edu>
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In article <1991May31.170349.15843@milton.u.washington.edu>, darkstar@milton.u.washington.edu (Alden Hackmann) writes:
|> We are the very new (3 days) owners of an Atari 1040 STe.    
|> There is a toggle on the options menu for something called Blitter.
|> The little manual has no reference to it at all.  Can anyone enlighten
|> us as to the meaning of this option?
|> 
|> Thank you very much
|> 
|> Alden F.M. Hackmann
|> darkstar@milton.u.washington.edu
|> 
|> "Wake up to find out that you are the eyes of the world."

The Blitter is a kind of coprocessor for graphics. If you move a window on
the screen or a dialog box will be drawn, then you must transfer a bit of
memory from on memory location to another. This on can faster be done from
the Blitter than from the 68000. The name stands for BitBlt chip. In the
ST is a Line-A Routine called BitBlt. If you switch on the Blitter entry in the
desktop, then this routine programms the Blitter. If you don't set that switch
the routine will emulate the function of the Blitter in software.

Greetings, Olaf 
-- 
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* Olaf Gerloff                     * Internet: GERLOFF@tubvm.cs.tu-berlin.de * 
* Technical University Berlin (FRG)*   or      gerloff@opal.cs.tu-berlin.de  * 
* Department of Computer Science   * BITNET  : GERLOFF@DB0TUI11              * 
* Computerbased Informationsystems * Usenet  : ...!mcsun!unido!opal!gerloff  * 
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