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Hardware > dma question

#3595 - jenswa - Fri Feb 28, 2003 8:37 pm

Is dma transfer (say for loading image data, like sprites and background)
really faster than the usual way? (just a for loop with an array)?

Just wonna know.
_________________
It seems this wasn't lost after all.

#3601 - ampz - Fri Feb 28, 2003 11:02 pm

In most normal CPU's (including most ARM CPU's), there is virtually no difference at all because of the internal cache memory.

However for CPU's w/o cache (like the GBA) there is a difference since the CPU doesn't have to fetch any instructions from the external memory while copying the data if DMA is used.