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#vga#breadboard#logicgates

The world's worst video card?

Ben Eater

1.4M subscribers • 28 videos on Hallway

YouTube
  • Recommended by 9 people: 8 on Hacker News and 1 on Lobsters.
  • Presented by Ben Eater

Beginner. No background in the topic needed.

7.1M views7 years ago9 recommendations

HardwareGraphics and audioElectronicsRetro computingRendering

Ben Eater explains how VGA signals work and builds a breadboard circuit from basic logic gates to output a video signal.

Let's build a circuit that displays an image on a VGA monitor! In this video, I talk about how VGA signals work and build a circuit that provides the correct timing of sync signals so that a monitor recognizes the signal. Support these videos on Patreon: patreon.com/beneater or eater.net/support for other ways to support. ------------------ Social media: Website: eater.net Twitter: x.com/beneater Patreon: patreon.com/beneater Reddit: reddit.com/r/beneater Special thanks to these supporters for making this video possible: Ben Dyson Ben Kamens Ben Williams Christopher Blackmon Debilu Krastas Eric Dynowski fxshlein Gonzalo Belascuen Ian Tait Jay Binks Jayne Gabriele Johnathan Roatch Jordan Scales Manne Moquist Marcus Classon Michael Burke Mirko Rener Nicholas Moresco Nick Wrightsman Onion Sniffer Paul Pluzhnikov Randy True Ric Allinson Robert Butler Sachin Chitale SonOfSofaman Vladimir Kanazir Örn Arnarson

Why it's here

9 people recommend this

What people say. Highly recommended as a fantastic, first-principles introduction to how video hardware and VGA timing work.

jameson Lobsters • Recommends

Build a video card from scratch
42View on Lobsters

dimatoron Hacker News • Recommends

On “CPU Made from 74HC Chips Is a Glorious Mess”

Ben Eater did a video on driving a VGA display using a breaboard circuit. He builds up to it in his usual amazing teaching style, highly recommend: link to this video
View on Hacker News

Diederichon Hacker News • Recommends

On “Show HN: 1.5kb Microkernel for Ben Eater's 6502 Computer”

I'm actually more excited to see a new Ben Eater video on youtube than anything else. His stuff is just fantastic. Even though it's lower level than I've ever worked, it's extremely entertaining and educational. His 6502 series is just great, but I want to highlight another couple of videos he did: "Let's build a circuit that displays an image on a VGA monitor! In this video, I talk about how VGA signals work and build a circuit that provides the correct timing of sync signals so that a monitor recognizes the signal." link to this video
View on Hacker News

MarioManon Hacker News • Recommends

On “Brown: color is weird [video]”

Not the same thing, but you reminded me of this since it's in a similar vein. Ben Eater went through the entire process of building a VGA "video card." Anyone with a basic understanding of logic circuits has enough background to understand it. Worth a watch. Part 1: link to this video Part 2: link
View on Hacker News

el_onion Hacker News • Recommends

On “A trip through the Graphics Pipeline (2011)”

Maybe something like Ben Eater's video card series? link to this video If i remember correctly he assembles a gfx card on a bread board. So its fairly fundamental
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daharton Hacker News • Recommends

On “A trip through the Graphics Pipeline (2011)”

This one might be interesting to you: link to this video “The world’s worst video card?” Ben builds a framebuffer display device on a bread board from scratch, you’ll understand what every transistor does at a high level in an hour (don’t miss part 2). That is abstractly what first principles graphics looked like some time ago - pixels were represented by a block of main memory, and the video system simply scanned that memory at the same frequency as the CRT monitor’s beam. I’d say it’s pretty important to remember that what counts as “first principles” graphics has changed over time, and there was a time before frame buffers (the first Pong game was displayed on an oscilloscope) and the way we use fra…
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vishnuharidason Hacker News • Recommends

On “NandGame – Build a Computer from Scratch”

Reminds me of Ben Eater's Youtube videos where he builds everything using basic gates on a breadboard. He made a video-card using ICs on a breadboard that fascinated me: link to this video
View on Hacker News

fowl2on Hacker News • Recommends

On “The Graphics Gremlin – An Open Source Retro ISA Video Card”

Even further to that end of the spectrum is "The World's Worst Graphics Card"1 on a breadboard with mostly discrete logic. Fascinating. 1 link to this video
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caymanjimon Hacker News • Recommends

On “An interactive look at how a video signal is made”

Ben Eater has a great video1 about building a video card from simple gates and other basic components. It goes into some detail about how a VGA signal is generated. 1: link to this video
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u/TheMicrobombin r/compsci • Mentions

On “Please somone help me , this is driving me crazy !”

Funny enough, there is a great video that has blown up on youtube just this past week about a guy creating a video card and how to create pixels and such on a monitor. link to this video Super in depth, I created pixels on a monitor using an Altera board (Simulates all the chips and logic gates this guys uses and runs it through a board) which was a lot of fun! One of my favorite classes in Computer Engineering.
21View on Reddit

u/Public-Study2242in r/FPGA • Mentions

Has anyone created a graphics card/engine? I watched Ben Eater's The world's worst video card? video a while ago, it was fun. I was wondering, is it reasonable for 1 person to create a graphics card using a FPGA? I don't mind if the output is VGA, HDMI or a TFT but I would prefer it to handle 60hz. Would the FPGA be pricey? I have no idea if its simple and mostly need ram to be attached or crazy hard that noone does this My current assumption is if the clock is fast enough to handle the video signal and I have enough ram for the pixels that it should be easy enough to do using a VGA or TFT as the output? I have no idea what's involved with HDMI
5View on Reddit

u/gunnnniiin r/compsci • Mentions

On “Abstractions of a Computer”

Not sure if it will answer your questions specifically, but Ben Eater has a fantastic YouTube channel focused on computer design and engineering. He even has a playlist where he builds a functioning computer on a breadboard. And recently he made a graphics card on a breadboard.
4View on Reddit

u/BaroquenLarynxin r/compsci • Mentions

On “Best place to get intro to computer graphics”

Ben Eater built a graphics card from circuitry to image display. link to this video
3View on Reddit

cromwellianon Hacker News • Mentions

On “Why Apple II Is the World's Best Selling Personal Computer (1978)”

…missing is, Commodore had purchased MOS Technology, just like Apple purchased PA Semi to make their own iPhone SoCs, and had spent years investing in custom silicon going back to the VIC in 1979. The Apple II did not have a "video chip". Wozniak had cobbled together a video chip out of a bunch of 74LS TTL chips. Here, learn to built one yourself: link to this video That's what I meant by "superior design". Commodore actually had integrated CMOS chips for video, audio, I/O, that they had designed in house and fabbed themselves. The Apple 2, well into the IIc days, was built like a semi-decent Arduino project. Even the Mac had gfx and DMA cobbled out of TTL chips.…
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ChuckNorris89on Hacker News • Mentions

On “Nyuzi – An Experimental Open-Source FPGA GPGPU Processor”

To clarify further, Nvidia and AMD (and probably other small players like ARM, Quallcomm, Imagination) own the patents on core shader tech, which are the building blocks of any modern GPU design. If you want to design a GPU IP that works around all their patents, you probably can, but unless you're a John Carmack x10, your resulting design would be horribly inefficient and not competitive enough to be worth the expensive silicon it will be etched on and probably not compatible to any modern API like Vulcan or DirectX. But if you just want to build your own meme GPU for education/shits and giggles, that doesn't follow any patents or APIs, then you can and some people already did: link to this video
View on Hacker News

lozengeon Hacker News • Mentions

On “Ask HN: How do I write a Linux driver for my 15 year old photo printer?”

Ben Eater has some videos showing the USB protocol on an oscilloscope. link link And some videos on using chips and breadboards to meet protocols- link to this video And a digital protocol too- link
View on Hacker News