Multimedia PC
Encyclopedia
The Multimedia PC, or MPC, was a recommended configuration for a PC with a CD-ROM
CD-ROM
A CD-ROM is a pre-pressed compact disc that contains data accessible to, but not writable by, a computer for data storage and music playback. The 1985 “Yellow Book” standard developed by Sony and Philips adapted the format to hold any form of binary data....
drive. The standard was set and named by the "Multimedia PC Marketing Council", which was a working group of the Software Publishers Association
Software and Information Industry Association
The Software & Information Industry Association is a United States based software trade association. The organization lobbies United States policy makers as well as conducting surveys and research and many conferences and webcasts....
(now the Software and Information Industry Association). The MPMC comprised companies including Microsoft
Microsoft
Microsoft Corporation is an American public multinational corporation headquartered in Redmond, Washington, USA that develops, manufactures, licenses, and supports a wide range of products and services predominantly related to computing through its various product divisions...
, Creative Labs, Dell, Gateway, and Fujitsu
Fujitsu
is a Japanese multinational information technology equipment and services company headquartered in Tokyo, Japan. It is the world's third-largest IT services provider measured by revenues....
. Any PC with the required standards could be called an "MPC" by licensing the use of the logo from the SPA.
CD-ROM drives were just coming to market in 1990, and it was difficult to concisely communicate to a consumer all the hardware requirements for using "multimedia software", which mostly meant "displaying video on a PC via a CD-ROM drive". The MPC standard was supposed to communicate this concisely, so a consumer buying hardware or software could simply look for the MPC logo and be assured of compatibility.
The MPC program was never a success and it is rare today to see software or hardware labeled with the term "MPC". As the standardized term failed to catch on, and as the Software Publishers Association turned away from consumer software in the late 1990s, interest in the MPC standard vanished. The problem of software labeling continues, especially in the field of computer games
Computer Games
"Computer Games" is a single by New Zealand group, Mi-Sex released in 1979 in Australia and New Zealand and in 1981 throughout Europe. It was the single that launched the band, and was hugely popular, particularly in Australia and New Zealand...
, where a multitude of 3D video cards has been manufactured with an extremely wide range of display capabilities, and no common industry labeling standard to let consumers know whether their card is powerful enough to let them play a particular game.
MPC Level 1
The first MPC minimum standard, set in 1991, was:- 16 MHz 386SXIntel 80386The Intel 80386, also known as the i386, or just 386, was a 32-bit microprocessor introduced by Intel in 1985. The first versions had 275,000 transistors and were used as the central processing unit of many workstations and high-end personal computers of the time...
CPU - 2 MBMegabyteThe megabyte is a multiple of the unit byte for digital information storage or transmission with two different values depending on context: bytes generally for computer memory; and one million bytes generally for computer storage. The IEEE Standards Board has decided that "Mega will mean 1 000...
RAM - 30 MB hard diskHard diskA hard disk drive is a non-volatile, random access digital magnetic data storage device. It features rotating rigid platters on a motor-driven spindle within a protective enclosure. Data is magnetically read from and written to the platter by read/write heads that float on a film of air above the...
- 256-color8-bit color8-bit color graphics is a method of storing image information in a computer's memory or in an image file, such that each pixel is represented by one 8-bit byte. The maximum number of colors that can be displayed at any one time is 256....
, 640×480 VGAVideo Graphics ArrayVideo Graphics Array refers specifically to the display hardware first introduced with the IBM PS/2 line of computers in 1987, but through its widespread adoption has also come to mean either an analog computer display standard, the 15-pin D-subminiature VGA connector or the 640×480 resolution...
video card - 1x (single speed) CD-ROMCD-ROMA CD-ROM is a pre-pressed compact disc that contains data accessible to, but not writable by, a computer for data storage and music playback. The 1985 “Yellow Book” standard developed by Sony and Philips adapted the format to hold any form of binary data....
drive using no more than 40% of CPU to read, with < 1 second seek time - Sound cardSound cardA sound card is an internal computer expansion card that facilitates the input and output of audio signals to and from a computer under control of computer programs. The term sound card is also applied to external audio interfaces that use software to generate sound, as opposed to using hardware...
outputting 22 kHz, 8-bit soundQuantization (sound processing)In signal processing and digital audio, quantization is the process of approximating a continuous range of values by a relatively small set of discrete symbols or integer values...
; and inputting 11 kHz, 8-bit sound - Windows 3.0Windows 3.0Windows 3.0, a graphical environment, is the third major release of Microsoft Windows, and was released on 22 May 1990. It became the first widely successful version of Windows and a rival to Apple Macintosh and the Commodore Amiga on the GUI front...
with Multimedia Extensions.
MPC Level 2
In 1993, an MPC Level 2 minimum standard was announced:- 25 MHz 486SXIntel 80486SXThe Intel's i486SX was a modified Intel 486DX microprocessor with its floating-point unit disconnected. All early 486SX chips were actually i486DX chips with a defective FPU...
CPU - 4 MB RAM
- 160 MB hard disk
- 16-bit colorHighcolourHigh color graphics is a method of storing image information in a computer's memory such that each pixel is represented by two bytes...
, 640×480 VGA video card - 2x (double speed) CD-ROM drive using no more than 40% of CPU to read at 1x, with < 400 ms seek time
- Sound card outputting 44 kHz, 16-bit "CD quality" sound.
- Windows 3.0 with Multimedia Extensions, or Windows 3.1.
MPC Level 3
In 1996, MPC Level 3 was announced:- 75 MHz Pentium CPU
- 8 MB RAM
- 540 MB hard disk
- Video system that can show 352×240 at 30 frames per secondFrame rateFrame rate is the frequency at which an imaging device produces unique consecutive images called frames. The term applies equally well to computer graphics, video cameras, film cameras, and motion capture systems...
, 16-bit color - MPEG-1MPEG-1MPEG-1 is a standard for lossy compression of video and audio. It is designed to compress VHS-quality raw digital video and CD audio down to 1.5 Mbit/s without excessive quality loss, making video CDs, digital cable/satellite TV and digital audio broadcasting possible.Today, MPEG-1 has become...
hardware or software video playback - 4x CD-ROM drive using no more than 40% of CPU to read, with < 250 ms seek time
- Sound card outputting 44 kHz, 16-bit "CD quality" sound
- Windows 3.11 or Windows 95Windows 95Windows 95 is a consumer-oriented graphical user interface-based operating system. It was released on August 24, 1995 by Microsoft, and was a significant progression from the company's previous Windows products...