What is 8bit?
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Printed Date: 18 March 2026 at 7:42pm
Topic: What is 8bit?
Posted By: slym
Subject: What is 8bit?
Date Posted: 06 July 2009 at 11:53am
| I really never understood what 8 bit is. Or 16 bit, 32 bit, 64 bit, etc. What is 8 bit? |
Replies:
Posted By: Hatch
Date Posted: 06 July 2009 at 12:06pm
|
Any "bit" number is 2 to the power of that number. For example, 8-bit is 2 to the power of 8, or 256. So an 8-bit image can use up to 256 colors. 1 bit is 2 colors, 16-bit is 65,356 colors and 32-bit is a whopping 4,294,967,296 colors. You can figure out the other bit values.
The reason for the powers of two is technical. Basically, a pixel in a 1-bit image uses the smallest unit of memory, a bit. The single bit can either be "on" or "off", 1 or 0, true or false, black or white. There are only two unique configurations of the single bit, so it can only contain two unique colors. A 2-bit image can use four colors, so a single two-bit pixel uses, you guessed it, two bits of memory. The possible configurations of two bits of memory are: 1) 00 2) 01 3) 10 4) 11 Since it can contain 4 unique settings, it can contain 4 unique colors, and so on up the bit values. And believe it or not, everything on your computer is made up of these little 1s and 0s. I know this is probably way more technical than what you were after, and I know I haven't explained it well. hopefully someone else can make it clearer (I need an editor :P). ------------- |
Posted By: greenraven
Date Posted: 06 July 2009 at 1:34pm
|
Originally posted by Hatch I know this is probably way more technical than what you were after, and I know I haven't explained it well. hopefully someone else can make it clearer (I need an editor :P). The short answer Hatch was going for was: Really crappy graphics. XD -------------  "pwnage comes with patience, practice and planning." ~ Jalonso 
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Posted By: ellie-is
Date Posted: 06 July 2009 at 1:42pm
| Well, if you think about Hatch's answer as being the definition of 8 bits, then 8 bits = pic with 256 colors. Pic with 256 colors aint really crappy graphics, is it? |
Posted By: Blueberry_pie
Date Posted: 07 July 2009 at 4:05am
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How long have you been on this site now, greenraven? You should know better than that. Graphical limitations do not automatically make an image crappy. When people say 8-bit, they're often referring to NES graphics (even though it was actually the processor that was 8-bit, which didn't really have a lot to do with the system's graphic capabilities). |
Posted By: Hatch
Date Posted: 07 July 2009 at 6:07am
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yerp, the bit numbers that video game console companies made such a big deal about didn't actually matter much to the consumer. They were just marketing bluster. ------------- |
Posted By: greenraven
Date Posted: 07 July 2009 at 6:37am
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Originally posted by Blueberry_pie How long have you been on this site now, greenraven? You should know better than that. Graphical limitations do not automatically make an image crappy. It was more or less a joke. I was merely comparing it to modern 3d rendered graphics.  ------------- "pwnage comes with patience, practice and planning." ~ Jalonso
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Posted By: slym
Date Posted: 07 July 2009 at 11:18am
| So then 4 bit is only 16 colors, 3 bit is only 8 colors, etc. Ok I get it now, Thanks for the replies. |