Patent ID: 7570267

Claim:
A system for dynamically configuring a graphics pipeline, the system comprising: a graphics processing unit; and a common core subunit, wherein: the graphics processing unit is configured to: receive a first stream of graphics data for processing; determine a first configuration of the common core subunit in response to the first stream of graphics data, wherein the first configuration adapts the common core subunit to process a pixel shader, a vertex shader or a geometry shader; configure the common core subunit to the first configuration; receive a second stream of graphics data for processing; determine a second configuration of the common core subunit in response to the second stream of graphics data, wherein the second configuration adapts the common core subunit to process a pixel shader, a vertex shader or a geometry shader, and wherein the second configuration is different than the first configuration; and configure the common core subunit to the second configuration; and the common core subunit is a hardware subelement of the graphics processing unit, wherein a configuration of the common core subunit is changeable from the first configuration to the second configuration.