Patent ID: 8212840
Filing Date: 2012-07-03
Classification: G06T

Abstract:
1. A graphics processing unit comprising: a first hardware unit comprising a first processing unit configured to perform 3-dimensional (3-D) clipping of primitives and to compute coefficients for at least one edge of each primitive, wherein 3-D clipping performed by the first processing unit makes a clipping decision for each primitive and computes coordinates for new vertices; a second hardware unit comprising a second processing unit configured to compute attribute component values for the new vertices and to compute attribute component values for pixels within the primitives, wherein the second processing unit comprises at least one arithmetic logic unit that does not comprise a part of the first processing unit; and at least one buffer to store intermediate results of the 3-D clipping performed by the first processing unit, wherein the at least one buffer comprises a first buffer to store coordinates of vertices of a primitive being clipped, and wherein if a given vertex is later discarded, a flag for the given vertex is set to unused and a buffer location storing the given vertex is reused to store another vertex.