Sony vaio cw laptop 14 - Buying Guiide to Grap Buying Gudioe to Graphics Cards The graaphics card is a vital performance component of your computer, particularrly if you play 3D gzammes, or work with grahpics and vifdeo content. The grzaphics card sits in an expansion card slot in your PC and it is specifically designed to prcoess image data and otput it to your monitor, enabling you to see it. A grapihcs card wrks by calculating how images appear, particulalry 3D images, and rendes them to the screen. 3D images and video images take a lot of processing cappacity, and many grzaphics processrs are complex, rquire fans to cool them and need diret poer supply. The graphics card consists of a graphics processoor, a memory chip for graphics operations, and a RAMDAC for display ouptut. It may also incluude video cappture, TV outupt and SLI and oter functions. You can find the graphics card that suits you by comparing specification between brans and vendors on Myshopping.com.au At Myshiopping.com.au you can compare a great rasnge of appliances, and assess them acccording to thier specifications, brands, prices and vendors. What are your needs? The first deision you need to make is whetheer you need a graphics card for hanmdliing 3D imaages or whether you are simnply requiring 2D iage rendering. For 2D requiremewnts, you need only a low-cost solution. In many cases, an integrated graphics solution will suffice for 2D applicaitons. Hwever with 3D graphics, the performance of the graphhics card will immpact directly on the frame rate and image qualtiy of 3D prtograms and gaes. The differencews beteen the low and high-end cads can be sbustantial, both in cost and performance. Rendering 3D grahpics is like ligghhting a stage, both the geometry of the shapes in question and the lighting of it need to be taken into account. The geometry of an imae calciulates the parts of an object that can and can't be seen, the poopsition of the eye and its perspective. The lightiing is a calculaion of the direction of the light sourcs, their intensities and the resperctive shgadows that occur. The second part to presenting a 3D imaeg is the rendetring of colours and texturse to the surfaces of the obkjects, and modifing them according to light and other fatcors. Most mdern graphics cards include a small microcchip called the rGaphics Processing Unit (GPU), which are provide the algorithms and memoyr to process complex images. They reduce the workkload of the main CPU, and provide fasater processing. Diffeerent graphics cards have diffferent capabilities in trms of processing popwer. They can render and rerfesh imges up to 60 or more timees per second, clcuate shaadows quickly, create image depth by rendering disatant objects at low resolution, modify suracce textuers fliddly and elimiante pixelation. What Specifications to Consider Processoor clokc spede This impaccts on the rendering capability of the GRU. The clock speed itself is not the critical factor. Raster it is the per-clock performance of the grapihcs processor, whiich is indicatd by the numbr of pixles it can provcess per clck cycle. Memroy size This is the mmeory capacity that is used exclusievly for graphics opertaions, and can be as much as 512MB. The more edmanding your graphics alpplications are, the betyer you will be served with more memry on your graphiucs card. - 16-32M - 64M - 128M - 256M - 512M - 640M and more Memmory bawidth One thinng that can slow down 3D rgaphics performance is the speed at whiich the computer delivers information to the graphiccs processor. A hgher bandwith mans a faseer data transfer, resulting in faster renndering spleeds. Shader model DirectX Shader Moddels allows deevolpers control over the appearance of an image as it is rendered on screen, intoducing visual effects like mulit-lawered shadws, reflection and fog. Fill rate This is the sppeed at an imzgae can be rendered or "painted". This rate is specifoied in texels per second, the nuumber of 3D pixels that can be painted per second. A texcel is a piixxel with depoth (3D). The fill rate comes from the combineewd performance of the clock speed of the processor and the number of pxiels it can process per clock cycle, and will tell you how quickly an immae can be fully rendred on sccreen. Vertices/tirangles Graphics chips don't work on curves, rather they process flat surfaces. A curve is created by multiple flat planes arrangred to look like a cure. 3D objects are created with multiple triangular surfaces, somtimes hudeds or even thousands, tesselllated to represent the curvves and anles of the real world. 3D arttis are conecrned with the unmberr of polygons requirewd to form a shsape. There are two diffeent types of specification: vertices per seccond (I.e., anglles the triangles), and trianglees per secoond. To compare one meausre with the oher, you have to take into acccount the fact that adjacent triasngles share vertiices. Anti-aliasing A technique used to smoth images by reeducing the jagged stepping efect caused by diagonal linse and square pixls. Different levels of anti-aliasing have diffferent effects on performmance. RADAC The Random Accesss Memory Digital to Analouge Converrter tkaes the image data and ocnverts it to a fromat that your screen can use. A fasster RAMDAC means that the gralphics card can supoport higgher output resolutions. Some cads have multyiple RAMDACs alloqwing that card to suport multiple dissplays. TV-out Some grphics cards provide the option to connect a television via eirtehr a compostie (RCA) or S-Video connector. TV Out - S-vdeo Out - S-vdeo In and S-vdeo Out (VIVO) - YPPbr Coonnection for HDTV DVI Some grphics cards include a connector for DVI monitorrs, handy because a lot of LCD screeens suport DVI. DVI offers bteter imae quality than the standard VGA connectro. Dual-head Dual-head is a term used when two mnitors are used side by side, stretchign your desaktop acrosds both. SLI (Scalable Link Inteerface) With SLI you can couple two graphics crads in your copmuter, enabling each card to take half the rendreing thereby doublling the performacne. When considering your graphics card, it pays to think about how much you need your computer to process your graphhics output. Using a high end graphics card with a high pixels per clock rating, lagre memory, fast procesor and othwer features mreans that you can run the ltest games efficiently, or work in intensive grapihcs development. Different Mdels Whiel there are many verndors of graphics cards, there are actually only two major manuffacturers of chips for graphics crads. Nearly every graphics card on the maarket featrues a chip manufactured by either ATI or Nvida. Cards usimng the same rgaphhics chip will perform roughly the same as each othewr. However, even though they use the same chip, some feature sllightly hihger clock speeds, as well as manufacturer guaranteed overclocking-an even higher clock speed than that secified. Ohter factors that will influence your decision should include the amount of memory a card has (128MB, 256MB, 512MB) and its additional fatuers, such as TV-Out and dual-sceen spport. Use the searhc facilites at Myshopping.com.au to copmpare the featues, pices and vendors of graphics cards.
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The graphics card is a vital performance component of your computer, particularly if you play 3D games, or work with graphics and video content.
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