Science talk weekly
The Graphics Processing Unit (GPU) is the fourth component in a series about computer hardware I am going to be talking about. They are typically referred to as a graphics card, because they look a little bit like a card that plugs into your motherboard. Graphics cards have come through many iterations over the past years, and are quite complex pieces of hardware. They are very similar to how your computer works. Being equipped with the information of the previous weeks, you will be able to appreciate how a GPU works. The card itself is made up of a board that has intricate circuitry in it. On the board are the components that do all the graphical processing for a computer. It is like a mini-motherboard, in that on a GPU there will be a processing unit(CPU), memory chips (RAM), and a heatsink for the processor. It also will have some ports and connections that will be visible from the outside of the PC, which provide the connections that allow you to plug your PC into a monitor. Part of the card will have the connections that allow you to plug it into its specific spot on the motherboard. There are different types of GPUs, and motherboards can be setup to take the different types. Some GPUs are designed to be able to run in parallel. The units can be bridged, or joined together, to get even more processing power out of your computer. The GPU is a specialized type of computer that does all of the calculations, drawing and rendering of graphics on your PC. When the computer accesses a program, the CPU will get all of the information and make it work. When there are graphics linked with the program, it then sends information to the GPU telling it to do the drawings. When you are playing a video game, first the GPU will draw a wire outline of the three dimensional object, then it will fill in all of the shapes with colour, and then do its final rendering and textures to complete the image. It doesn’t sound like too much, and you might be thinking, well the CPU could probably do it. Consider this, the GPU will do all of that 60 times per second, which can be quite an intensive job to do, especially if it is doing very rich and detailed fast moving images that one may encounter when gaming.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
How this beganWhat started out as a quick weekly Q&A in my school's paper newsletter has grown into an online multimedia science spot. Archives
October 2015
Categories |