Statement of Direction - IRIX 4.0

[Loren Buck Buchanan]

In article <9012132005.AA26677 at forest.asd.sgi.com> baskett at forest.asd.sgi.COM (Forest Baskett) writes:
>While Jeff may not be able to see more than 6 or 8 bits per color
>many of us can.  Our most sophisticated and demanding customers use
>12 bits per color in some of their work and it is clear that 10 bit
>DAC's would more fully cover the color spectrum that you can see
>even on today's monitors.  I believe that systems will eventually
>improve but it's hard to tell when.  Eight bits per color is very
>well established economically and is tough to displace.

I agree with Forest that eight bits is going to be tough to displace, 
because for many applications that is enough.  I disagree with Forest
on today's monitors, I don't think all monitors are that good (but then
Forest may only be familiar with those sold by SGI ;-).  Another thing
about all of this, is the environment the monitors are put in.  I don't
think a 10 or more bit system will do much good in brightly lit office
environment (unless someone has developed brighter phosphors).  I am
not certain I would want a light valve based monitor just to have much
brighter highs.  In fact for my environment, I could not justify going
beyond eight bits unless it was real cheap (the only added cost being,
of course, the memory and the DAC), and even then it might be a hard sell.

B Cing U

Buck

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