When the AOL caching system detects that an object is an image, it sends the image through a compression manager on the AOL system network before caching it.
Compression makes images smaller for faster retrieval from the cache to members.
Members can individually disable AOL graphics compression, but most choose to allow compression because it speeds up web page delivery. The object must be in the BMP, GIF, JPEG, or Progressive JPEG format. Known Problems JPEG's wider than 640 pixels Some images wider than 640 pixels will be resized to a width of 640 pixels after being compressed by the JG compression software. This a limitation of the compression software that is used for compressing photo images. If it is necessary to the design of a web site to use images that are wider then 640 pixels, a GIF must be used in order to insure that the image will not be resized.