Magic.TXD/Choosing the right Encoding/

The Magic.TXD editor supports many forms of RW texture encodings. Choosing the right encoding in the right situation is important if you want to mind the visual quality and performance of your mods. Encodings differ in size, color storage degradation, performance and limits. This article is meant to give you a quick overview.

General Format Overview
Format Name	Storage Form	Quality	Alpha	Byte Size	Dimension Constraints	Supported Games	Supported Platforms
RASTER_1555	16bit raw	good	yes	2bpp	none	III, VC, SA	PC, XBOX, PS2
RASTER_565	16bit raw	good	no	2bpp	none	III, VC, SA	PC, XBOX, mobile
RASTER_4444	16bit raw	good	yes	2bpp	none	III, VC, SA	PC, XBOX, mobile
RASTER_LUM	8bit raw mono	high	no	1bpp	none	III, VC, SA	PC, XBOX
RASTER_8888	32bit raw	high	yes	4bpp	none	III, VC, SA	PC, XBOX, PS2
RASTER_888	32bit raw	high	no	4bpp	none	III, VC, SA	PC, XBOX
RASTER_555	16bit raw	good	no	2bpp	none	III, VC, SA	PC, XBOX
DXT1	4x4 block compression	medium	yes	4bits per pixel	multiple of four	III, VC, SA	PC, XBOX, mobile
DXT2/4	4x4 block compression	medium	yes	1bpp	multiple of four	III, VC, SA	PC
DXT3/5	4x4 block compression	medium	yes	1bpp	multiple of four	III, VC, SA	PC, XBOX, mobile
4bit palette	16 indexed colors	medium	yes	4bits per pixel	none	III, VC	PC, XBOX, PS2
8bit palette	256 indexed colors	medium	yes	1bpp	none	III, VC	PC, XBOX, PS2
RASTER_LUM_ALPHA	16bit raw mono	high	yes	2bpp	none	SA	PC

Platform specifics
Platform Name	Max Dimension	Dimension Constraint
PC	4096	none
PlayStation 2	1024	power of two
XBOX	1024	power of two
S3TC mobile	2048	multiple of four
uncompressed mobile	2048	none
AMD TC	2048	multiple of four
PowerVR	2048	power of two