Cache memory and method for use in generating computer graphics texture
US6002407A · kind A · utility
Assignee
Inventor
Key dates
| Filing date | Dec 16, 1997 |
| Grant date | Dec 14, 1999 |
| Priority date | — |
| Expiry date | Dec 16, 2017 |
Classification
- Technology area (CPC G)Physics
- CPC primaryG06T15/005
- WIPO fieldComputer technology
- WIPO sectorElectrical engineering
Abstract
The present invention uses a novel cache memory allowing a high texture calculation rate while using a low cost single bank DRAM hardware. In accordance with this invention, pixels are processed in a cluster, for example by processing pixels within a region as a cluster of pixels, with the regions of pixels arranged in a fixed gridwork across the area of the display with fixed, unchanging boundaries. All polygon-pixels occurrences within a region are processed together in one operation. Texture processing for all polygen-pixels within a region are processed together in one operation. Texture professing for all polygon-pixels within a region are broken down in to a set of information gathering operations for all polygon-pixels within the region, followed by a high speed fetching of all needed texels to process the entire region. Following this, high speed interpolation operations are preformed via use a specially arranged on chip RAM and a hardware pipeline calculation.
Source: USPTO / EPO open patent data. Objective bibliographic and citation counts.