A way of displaying images on a computer screen or other graphics device such that the basic unit is the pixel. Lines and characters on the screen are drawn pixel by pixel. The resolution and complexity of the image depends on how many pixels there are in total, and how many bits are assigned to each pixel. The more bits per pixel, the more different colours or shades of grey. A single graphics device can operate in a number of different graphics modes with different resolutions and colour selections. A common mode for a desktop PC would be 1024 by 768 pixels with 16 777 216 different colours available for each pixel. See also computer graphics, text mode.