Explanation of Graphic Cards
A graphics card--also called video card--does exactly what the name implies: It processes the information that generates graphics on your monitor. As such, it is an integral part of any modern home computer. Graphics cards have come along way over the years, with innovation spurred by the relentless demands of computer games and other software applications. Today, they are one of the most sophisticated--and sometimes expensive--individual hardware components inside your computer.
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History
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In older times, graphics were generated in chips on the mainboard itself, and this setup was called a "graphics controller" rather than a "graphics card." But, as time went on, computer software programmers became more ambitious about what they wanted their graphics to do, and in 1995 companies began to manufacture more powerful add-on cards that offered expanded graphics abilities. Nowadays, few mainboards have any internal graphics capability; you have to buy a graphics card.
Architecture
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A graphics card is not unlike a mainboard. It contains a central processor, a cooling system, and random access memory (RAM). It has its own power hookups. It has connectors for various video components, potentially ranging from old-school s-video to newfangled HDMI. The difference of course is that the mainboard is the brain of the operation of the entire computer, while the graphics card is the brain of the operation of only the graphical systems, and it plugs into and depends upon the mainboard.
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Measures of Performance
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Graphics cards are judged by a few key hardware values. The central processor, called the graphics processing unit (GPU), is judged by its clock speed (up to 4 GHz as of 2010), and by the number of "pipelines" it has. Pipelines are responsible for translating 3D images onto your 2D screen. Graphics cards are also judged by their RAM; the more the better. In addition to these core values, there are many other factors that some people find significant, ranging from brand loyalty, to power consumption and heat dissipation, to various highly technical details too arcane to mention.
Outputs
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A graphics card might contain any number of outputs. There might be a VGA graphics output, for connecting to computers monitors on an analog basis. Most computers and monitors still have a VGA connector. There might be---and increasingly will be---a DVI or HDMI output, for connecting to a computer monitor digitally. There might be a composite video output, which utilizes a single yellow RCA connector, and is useful for connecting to old televisions and also to other hardware, such as camcorders and the Nintendo Wii. There might be a component video output, which utilizes three RCA connectors---red, green, and blue---for connecting to many DVD players and televisions. And there might be an s-video output, useful for multiple kinds of video electronics.
The Future
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Video game graphics continue to become more sophisticated, and, even without that pressure, there's a lot of room left for graphics cards to improve upon existing video games by rendering them more faithfully, more quickly and more smartly. Graphics cards will continue to become considerably more powerful for at least the next several years. Eventually, development may level out if the video game industry is no longer able to economically increase the graphical complexity of tomorrow's games.
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References
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