determine the amout of video ram

[Kevin Freeman]

On Thu, 2003-12-11 at 15:23, Rick Stevens wrote:

> Don't forget the color depth.  If you go to 8- or 16-bit color rather
> than the 24-bit color, you cut your memory requirements by 33-66%.  You
> can then get the 1152x864 size, but not as many colors.  Here is the
> video RAM needed for an 1152x864 display:
> 
> 	24-bit:	24MB
> 	16-bit:	15MB
> 	8-bit:	7.5MB
> 

Those numbers are very "generous" ...  ;)

> If all you can give is 8MB, you're limited to an 8-bit 1152x864 display
> (256 colors).  The formula is:
> 
>      video RAM needed (in MB) = (width x height x number-of-bits)/1048576

This result of the above formula is mega bits, not mega bytes.  You need
to divide the result by 8 to get the video RAM in MB.  Therefore, a
display of 1152x864x24 requires slightly less than 3MB of video RAM.


Kevin Freeman