The Color Graphics Adapter reference article from the English Wikipedia on 24-Jul-2004 (provided by Fixed Reference: snapshots of Wikipedia from wikipedia.org)

Color Graphics Adapter

The Color Graphics Adapter (CGA), introduced in 1981, was IBM's first colour graphics card, and as such, colour computer display standard, for the PC. CGA could display 80×25 or 40×25 character text in 16 colours, 640×200 pixels bitmap graphics in 2 colours or 320×200 in 4 colours, consisting of two palettes: either cyan, magenta, black, and white or green, red, yellow, and black (PC video modes 0-6).

The standard IBM CGA graphics card was equipped with 16 kilobytes of video memory. For business and wordprocessing use, IBM launched its Monochrome Display Adapter (MDA) at the same time as the CGA. The MDA produced a significantly sharper display in 80-column mode.

See also

• Enhanced Graphics Adapter (EGA)
• Video Graphics Array (VGA)

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This article was originally based on material from the Free On-line Dictionary of Computing and is used with permission under the GFDL.

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