Pixel
From Sega Retro
Pixel is a contraction of Picture Element. A single, indivisible unit that makes up an image when used in conjunction with many (perhaps thousands or millions) other pixels. Typically, the visible part of the Mega Drive screen consists of 71680 pixels (i.e. it has a resolution of 320x224).
Units
- 1 megapixel (MPixel) = 1 million pixels
- 1 gigapixel (GPixel) = 1 billion pixels (1000 MPixels)
Fillrate
The term fillrate refers to the number of pixels a video card or graphics chipset can render in a second.
The units used to measure fillrate:
- 1 megapixel/sec (MPixel/s) = 1 million pixels per second
- 1 gigapixel/sec (GPixel/s) = 1 billion pixels per second (1000 MPixels/s)
The fillrates for Sega consoles:
- Sega Master System - 5.3693175 Mpixels/s (NTSC), 5.3203424 Mpixels/s (PAL)
- Sega Mega Drive - 13.3 Mpixels/s
- Sega Saturn - 57.2728 Mpixels/sec (NTSC), 56.875 Mpixels/sec (PAL)
- Sega Dreamcast - 3.2 GPixels/s (opaque polygons), 100–500 MPixels/s (translucent polygons)