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You are here: MacNN Forums > Hardware - Troubleshooting and Discussion > Mac Notebooks > Thousands of colors difference?

Thousands of colors difference?
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robby818
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Mar 16, 2002, 01:36 PM
 
Is there a visible difference bet displaying thousands of colors vs. millions of colors? I ask bec i'm not sure if i see any difrecn on the screen of my 600 mhz ibook. I have read that using thousands of colors improves system performance but if millions looks better i'd prob use it. Is the LCD phys. capable of displaying millions of colors or is the diff only seen when connecting an external monitor capable of millions of colors?
     
voodoo
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Mar 16, 2002, 01:42 PM
 
If you are using OS X then you can see a lot of differece between thousands and millions of colors. Especially if you look at the shading on windows and the like. In OS9 the difference is a lot more subtle, because OS9 was designed to look good in 256 color mode.
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iDaver
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Mar 16, 2002, 06:59 PM
 
You'll notice the difference between 16 bit color and 24 bit color mainly in photographs. It's most noticeable in shots of the sky, where you'll see color banding between shades of blue.

Have a look at this photo at both resolutions and you'll see what I mean.
http://rockymountainscenery.com/mtevans4.html
     
Cipher13
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Mar 16, 2002, 07:20 PM
 
Yeah, it depends on what you're looking at... shots with gradients, you'll definately notice the difference (if the gradient is of high bit depth).

If the image was exported as 24- or- 32 (meh, same thing) -bit then you'll definately notice the difference.
     
anna katzner
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Mar 16, 2002, 08:58 PM
 
it' s very easy to see a difference between 32k and 16mil colors, even in the finder:

create a folder on your desktop, label it to some color (e.g. orange) and change the colors to 32k - you will see "banding" on the folder. change it back to 16mil - banding's gone.

this is a good example of where 32k vs. 16mil actually affects your visual eperience: gradients.

hth, anna
     
robby818  (op)
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Mar 17, 2002, 02:30 AM
 
this would explain why i thought my desktop looked odd when i powered up my ibook for the first time on friday. I thought i had a defective lcd but now after upping the number of colors displayed things look much better. thanks for the replies.
     
l008com
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Mar 17, 2002, 03:18 AM
 
Note: Thousands of colors is 65535 colors, not 32K colors.

Right?
     
Cipher13
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Mar 17, 2002, 04:33 AM
 
Originally posted by l008com:
<STRONG>Note: Thousands of colors is 65535 colors, not 32K colors.

Right?</STRONG>
Right - 32 bit, not 32 K.
     
tinrib
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Mar 17, 2002, 05:30 AM
 
Originally posted by Cipher13:
<STRONG>

Right - 32 bit, not 32 K.</STRONG>
or even 16 bit? 2^16=65536
     
blase
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Mar 19, 2002, 04:08 PM
 
Wouldn't it be faster to use thousands of colors over millions of colors though?
     
OreoCookie
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Mar 21, 2002, 04:57 PM
 
Didn't notice any difference in speed.
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Voch
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Mar 21, 2002, 05:29 PM
 
I think the Finder is a bit more responsive to double-clicking and stuff like that in "Thousands" as opposed to "Millions" on my iBook/500/384MB.

Voch
     
Arkham_c
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Mar 22, 2002, 10:33 AM
 
Originally posted by l008com:
<STRONG>Note: Thousands of colors is 65535 colors, not 32K colors.

Right?</STRONG>
Actually, no. On Windows, this is correct. Since 2^16 is 65535 this is a logical conclusion, but on a Mac they use 1 bit for an alpha channel in the 16-bit color space, leaving 15 bits for actual colors. So, on a Mac, 16-bit is really 15-bit plus an alpha channel, or 32768 colors.

That's the same reason people think that 24-bit and 32-bit color is the same. A 32-bit image uses 24 bits of color data, but it also has 8-bits for alpha channels.
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