Free webp to jpg
EN
Image MIME Reference
Generic-RAW

Digital Camera Raw (Generic Linux MIME)

image/x-dcraw
VS

Truevision TGA (Legacy MIME Alias)

image/x-tga
TGA

A complete technical comparison of Digital Camera Raw (Generic Linux MIME) and Truevision TGA (Legacy MIME Alias) — covering compression, feature support, browser compatibility, magic bytes, and when to choose each format.

Equal browser support

Feature Support

Feature Generic-RAW TGA
Transparency (Alpha) ✕ No Yes
Animation Support ✕ No ✕ No
Progressive Loading ✕ No ✕ No
HDR Support Yes ✕ No
EXIF Metadata Yes ✕ No
ICC Color Profile Yes ✕ No
Digital Camera Raw (Generic Linux MIME)
image/x-dcraw
Extension
.raw
Container Varies (Predominantly TIFF/EP)
Compression Lossless / Uncompressed
Algorithm
Varies (Often Lossless JPEG ITU-T81 or uncompressed)
Color Depth 12-bit, 14-bit, 16-bit
Developed by freedesktop.org (MIME mapping) / Dave Coffin (dcraw tool)
Released 1997
Magic Bytes
Varies by vendor format
Full Generic-RAW reference →
Truevision TGA (Legacy MIME Alias)
image/x-tga
Extension
.tga.icb.vda.vst
Container Truevision TGA Footer/Header
Compression Uncompressed / Run-Length Encoding (RLE)
Algorithm
NoneRLE
Color Depth 8-bit (Grayscale or Indexed), 16-bit (High Color), 24-bit (True Color), 32-bit (True Color with Alpha Channel)
Developed by Truevision Inc.
Released 1984
Magic Bytes
54 52 55 45 56 49 53 49 4F 4E 2D 58 46 49 4C 45 2E 00 (At the end of the file)
Full TGA reference →

Browser Support Comparison

Browser Generic-RAW TGA
Chrome Chrome
✕ ✕
Firefox Firefox
✕ ✕
Safari Safari
✕ ✕
Edge Edge
✕ ✕
IE IE (Legacy)
✕ ✕
Generic-RAW

Generic-RAW Strengths

  • Provides a unified, highly useful catch-all MIME type for application developers who just need to know if a file is a raw image, rather than tracking 50+ individual camera extensions
  • Deeply integrated into the Linux desktop ecosystem, ensuring file manager thumbnails work seamlessly via tools like ufraw-thumbnailer
Limitations
  • Not an official IANA standard
  • Can cause conflicts where standard TIFF files are misidentified as raw camera data by over-aggressive MIME sniffers
  • The underlying 'dcraw' tool was abandoned by its creator in 2018 (though its successor, LibRaw, continues to maintain the ecosystem)
TGA

TGA Strengths

  • Incredibly simple byte layout allows developers to write custom loaders and exporters in a few dozen lines of code, bypassing the need for heavy external libraries
  • Native support for 8-bit alpha channels ensures flawless transparency masking for real-time 3D rendering
  • Fast, predictable RLE decoding requires almost no CPU overhead compared to DEFLATE (PNG) or DCT (JPEG)
Limitations
  • RLE compression is relatively weak by modern standards, resulting in large file sizes
  • Lacks a standard magic byte header at the beginning of the file, making file-sniffing unreliable for older v1.0 files
  • Zero support in web browsers; must be converted to PNG or WebP for web delivery

When to choose which format

Generic-RAW
Use Generic-RAW when…
  • Linux Desktop File Associations (GNOME/KDE)
  • Thumbnail Generation for Raw Images (UFRaw/LibRaw)
  • Server-side Image Processing Fallbacks
TGA
Use TGA when…
  • Video Game 3D Textures and Materials
  • 3D Rendering and Animation Sequences
  • Legacy Video Production Workflows

More comparisons

Generic-RAW vs ACES → TGA vs ACES → Generic-RAW vs APNG → TGA vs APNG → Generic-RAW vs AVCI → TGA vs AVCI → Generic-RAW vs AVCS → TGA vs AVCS → Generic-RAW vs AVIF → TGA vs AVIF → All comparisons →
Share this comparison