CertiGuide to A+ (Core Hardware)  9  Chapter 1000:  Multimedia       9  III  Video Cards

III  Video Cards 1 Color Depth

Before we continue on discussing the various ins and outs of how a video card works, let's take some time to discuss how an image is displayed on your monitor.

The most basic element of any graphic display is the pixel (short for picture element). The number of pixels used to make up the entire display is referred to as the resolution of the display.

This is commonly expressed by writing the number of horizontal pixels by the number of vertical pixels. Commonly used image resolutions are 640x480, 800x600, and 1,024x768.

By simply multiplying these numbers together you have the total number of pixels that make up the image display.

These pixels are actually made up of even smaller red, green, and blue dots.

By varying the intensity (brightness) of these dots the color of a single pixel can be changed into any color that is visible by the human eye.

For example changing the brightness of all three dots to their maximum intensity produces a white pixel.

By completely turning off all three of these dots, a black pixel is produced.

III  Video Cards 1 Color Depth