Patent ID: 7812845
Filing Date: 2010-10-12
Classification: G06F,G06T,G09G

Abstract:
1. A PC-based computing system comprising: system memory for storing software graphics applications, software drivers and graphics libraries, and; an operating system (OS), stored in said system memory; one or more graphics applications, stored in said system memory, for generating a stream of geometrical data and graphics commands supporting (i) the representation of one or more 3D objects in a scene having 3D geometrical characteristics and (ii) the viewing of images of said one or more 3D objects in said scene during an interactive process carried out between said PC-based computing system and a user of said PC-based computing system; one or more graphics libraries, stored in said system memory, for storing data used to implement said stream of geometrical data and graphics commands; a central processing unit (CPU), for executing said OS, said graphics applications, said drivers and said graphics libraries; a CPU bus; a CPU/memory interface module for interfacing with said CPU by way of said CPU bus; a display surface for displaying said images by graphically displaying frames of pixel data; a plurality of GPU-driven pipeline cores arranged in a parallel architecture and operating according to one or more parallelization modes of operation, determined during the generation of each said frame of pixel data, so that said GPU-driven pipeline cores process geometrical data and graphics commands in a parallel manner; wherein said one or more parallelization modes of operation include a time division mode, an image division mode, and an object division mode; a silicon chip having a routing unit and a control unit; and software multi-pipe drivers, stored in said system memory; wherein said routing unit (i) routes the stream of geometrical data and graphics commands from said graphics application to one or more of said GPU-driven pipeline cores, and (ii) routes pixel data output from one or more of said GPU-driven pipeline cores during the composition of each frame of pixel data corresponding to a final image, for display on said display surface; wherein said control unit accepts commands from said software multi-pipe drivers, over said CPU bus, and controls components within said silicon chip, including said routing unit;