Patent ID: 6366289
Filing Date: 2002-04-02
Classification: G06F,G09G

Abstract:
A method for managing a virtual frame buffer comprising blocks comprising compressed pixels and blocks comprising uncompressed pixels stored at arbitrary locations in physical memory, the method comprising:receiving a request to access a pixel in the virtual frame buffer, wherein the request specifies an address of the pixel; mapping the address of the request to a location in a block of pixels stored at an arbitrary location in physical memory, wherein the block of pixels is capable of being in one of the following two formats, a compressed format and an uncompressed format; determining whether the block of pixels stored at an arbitrary location in physical memory is of the compressed or uncompressed format; when the block is of the compressed format, initiating a decompression process on the block of compressed format, allocating memory at an arbitrary location to store the block of compressed format in uncompressed format, and reclaiming memory from the block of compressed format; when the block is of the uncompressed format, allowing the access request to be completed to the pixel; and when compressing a block of decompressed format, initiating a compression process on the block of decompressed format, allocating memory at an arbitrary location to store the block of decompressed format in compressed format, and reclaiming memory from the block of decompressed format; wherein memory reclaimed from a block of decompressed format of the virtual frame buffer is allocable for a block of compressed format of the virtual frame buffer, and memory reclaimed from a block of compressed format of the virtual frame buffer is allocable for a block of decompressed format of the virtual frame buffer.