Patent ID: 8587793

Claim:
A print image processing apparatus, comprising: N image processing circuits, N is an integer equal to or more than 2; a dividing unit that divides print data into sections, each section having N pages; a selection unit that estimates, every section of N pages, a necessary time corresponding to each of (i) a page-based parallel method for allocating image processing of the N pages to the N image processing circuits in units of pages to perform the image processing of the N pages in parallel, and (ii) a paginal-object-based parallel method for allocating image processing of each single page to the N image processing circuits in units of objects to perform the image processing of the objects of each single page in parallel, and selects one of the page-based parallel method and the paginal-object-based parallel method such that the estimated necessary time corresponding to the selected one of the parallel methods is shorter than the estimated necessary time corresponding to the other parallel method; and an allocation unit that allocates image processing of the N pages to the N image processing circuits, respectively, according to the parallel method selected by the selection unit.