<P> In 1974 Evans & Sutherland released the first commercial framebuffer, costing about $15,000 . It was capable of producing resolutions of up to 512 by 512 pixels in 8 - bit grayscale, and became a boon for graphics researchers who did not have the resources to build their own framebuffer . The New York Institute of Technology would later create the first 24 - bit color system using three of the Evans & Sutherland framebuffers . Each framebuffer was connected to an RGB color output (one for red, one for green and one for blue), with a Digital Equipment Corporation PDP 11 / 04 minicomputer controlling the three devices as one . </P> <P> In 1975, the UK company Quantel produced the first commercial full - color broadcast framebuffer, the Quantel DFS 3000 . It was first used in TV coverage of the 1976 Montreal Olympics to generate a picture - in - picture inset of the Olympic flaming torch while the rest of the picture featured the runner entering the stadium . </P> <P> The rapid improvement of integrated - circuit technology made it possible for many of the home computers of the late 1970s (such as the Apple II) to contain low - color framebuffers . While initially derided for poor performance in comparison to the more sophisticated graphics devices used in computers like the Atari 400, framebuffers eventually became the standard for all personal computers . Today, nearly all computers with graphical capabilities utilize a framebuffer for generating the video signal . </P> <P> Framebuffers also became popular in high - end workstations and arcade system boards throughout the 1980s . SGI, Sun Microsystems, HP, DEC and IBM all released framebuffers for their workstation computers . These framebuffers were usually of a much higher quality than could be found in most home computers, and were regularly used in television, printing, computer modeling and 3D graphics . Framebuffers were also used by Sega for its high - end arcade boards, which were also of a higher quality than on home computers . </P>

Who handle the graphics that are displayed on the monitor