Patent ID: 7626587

Claim:
A computer system, including: a processor; a display device having a display screen; and a graphics unit coupled to the display device and including graphics memory that defines at least two frame buffers, said at least two frame buffers holding a virtual desktop image that cannot be entirely displayed on the display screen, wherein the graphics unit is configured to assert multiple sets of filtered display data to the display device, each of the sets of filtered display data is computed from a different subset of the display data in the at least two frame buffers and is associated with a different portal of the virtual desktop image, each portal is configurable to correspond to any region of the virtual desktop image, and the graphics unit and the processor are configured to assert to the display device a sequence of said sets of filtered display data to cause the display device to display images of portals that appear to move from a first portion of the virtual desktop image to a second portion of the virtual desktop image, wherein the processor is configured to perform multi-display operations in which the processor independently generates multiple frames of display data for simultaneous display and asserts the frames to the graphics unit, and the graphics unit is configured to store the frames in the frame buffers and to assert display data determined by at least a subset of the display data in each of the frame buffers to the display device for simultaneous display.