Texas Instruments Graphics Architecture
Encyclopedia
Texas Instruments Graphics Architecture (TIGA) was a graphics interface standard created by Texas Instruments
that defined the software interface to graphics processors
. Using this standard, any software written for TIGA should work correctly on a TIGA-compliant graphics interface card.
The TIGA standard is independent of resolution and color depth
which provides a certain degree of future proof
ing. This standard was designed for high-end graphics.
However, TIGA was not widely adopted. Instead, VESA
and Super VGA became the de facto standard for PC graphics devices after the VGA
.
Texas Instrument's TMS34010
and TMS34020 Graphics System Processors (GSP) were the only TIGA-compliant graphics processors.
The primary manufacturers of mainstream TIGA cards for the PC clone market included Number Nine Visual Technology
and Hercules. Number Nine's PPC_060 was a well-known card which found acceptance in the CAD market. Hercules manufactured cards such as the Graphics Station and Chrome lines which were marketed primarily toward users of Microsoft Windows. In the early 1990s, Texas Instruments France (which had marketing control for the TIGA architecture and GSP chipsets in Europe) experimented with manufacturing and selling its own range of consumer oriented video cards based on TIGA and aimed at speeding up the user experience of Windows. These products were named TIGA Diamond (34020 based) and TIGA Star (34010 based), and provided a platform for selling TI DRAM and video palette chips as well as the GSP chips themselves.
Despite the superiority of the technology in comparison to typical SuperVGA cards of the era, the relatively high cost and emerging local bus graphics standards meant that IT distributors and PC manufacturers could not see a niche for these products at consumer level.
In many ways, the TMS34010 and graphics team at TI were primary contributors to the evolutionary process that lead to current windows accelerators, the APIs used by Microsoft, and 3D gaming for both consoles and PCs.
Texas Instruments
Texas Instruments Inc. , widely known as TI, is an American company based in Dallas, Texas, United States, which develops and commercializes semiconductor and computer technology...
that defined the software interface to graphics processors
Graphics processing unit
A graphics processing unit or GPU is a specialized circuit designed to rapidly manipulate and alter memory in such a way so as to accelerate the building of images in a frame buffer intended for output to a display...
. Using this standard, any software written for TIGA should work correctly on a TIGA-compliant graphics interface card.
The TIGA standard is independent of resolution and color depth
Color depth
In computer graphics, color depth or bit depth is the number of bits used to represent the color of a single pixel in a bitmapped image or video frame buffer. This concept is also known as bits per pixel , particularly when specified along with the number of bits used...
which provides a certain degree of future proof
Future proof
The phrase future proofing describes the exclusive process of trying to anticipate future developments, so that action can be taken to minimize possible negative consequences, and to seize opportunities. For more on the process and practitioners, see Futures studies.-Data storage:Electronically...
ing. This standard was designed for high-end graphics.
However, TIGA was not widely adopted. Instead, VESA
VESA
VESA is an international standards body for computer graphics founded in 1989 by NEC Home Electronics and eight other video display adapter manufacturers.VESA's initial goal was to produce a standard for 800×600 SVGA resolution video displays...
and Super VGA became the de facto standard for PC graphics devices after the VGA
Video Graphics Array
Video 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...
.
Texas Instrument's TMS34010
TMS34010
The TMS34010 was the first programmable graphics processor integrated circuit . First silicon was working at Texas Instruments in Houston in December 1985, and first shipment was to IBM's workstation facility in Kingston, New York, in January 1986...
and TMS34020 Graphics System Processors (GSP) were the only TIGA-compliant graphics processors.
The primary manufacturers of mainstream TIGA cards for the PC clone market included Number Nine Visual Technology
Number Nine Visual Technology
Number Nine Visual Technology Corporation was a manufacturer of video graphics chips and cards from 1982 to 1999. Number Nine developed the first 128-bit graphics processor , as well as the first 256-color and 16.8 million color cards....
and Hercules. Number Nine's PPC_060 was a well-known card which found acceptance in the CAD market. Hercules manufactured cards such as the Graphics Station and Chrome lines which were marketed primarily toward users of Microsoft Windows. In the early 1990s, Texas Instruments France (which had marketing control for the TIGA architecture and GSP chipsets in Europe) experimented with manufacturing and selling its own range of consumer oriented video cards based on TIGA and aimed at speeding up the user experience of Windows. These products were named TIGA Diamond (34020 based) and TIGA Star (34010 based), and provided a platform for selling TI DRAM and video palette chips as well as the GSP chips themselves.
Despite the superiority of the technology in comparison to typical SuperVGA cards of the era, the relatively high cost and emerging local bus graphics standards meant that IT distributors and PC manufacturers could not see a niche for these products at consumer level.
Impact
The (limited) success of the graphics cards paved the way for products based upon various derivatives and clones of IBM's 8514 architecture. Part of the effort to make graphics accelerators useful required TI to convince Microsoft that the internal interfaces to its Windows Operating System had to be adaptable instead of hard-coded. Indeed, all versions of Windows prior to Windows 3.0 were "hard-coded" to specific graphics hardware.In many ways, the TMS34010 and graphics team at TI were primary contributors to the evolutionary process that lead to current windows accelerators, the APIs used by Microsoft, and 3D gaming for both consoles and PCs.