Culling before setup in viewport and culling unit
US7400325B1 · kind B1 · utility
Assignee
Inventors
Key dates
| Filing date | Aug 6, 2004 |
| Grant date | Jul 15, 2008 |
| Priority date | — |
| Expiry date | Aug 2, 2026 |
Classification
- Technology area (CPC G)Physics
- CPC primaryG06T11/40
- WIPO fieldComputer technology
- WIPO sectorElectrical engineering
Abstract
The VPC unit and setup unit of a graphics processing subsystem perform culling operations. The VPC unit performs culling operations on geometric primitives falling within a specific criteria, such as having a property within of a numerical range limit. This limit reduces the complexity of the VPC unit. As increasing rendering complexity typically produces a large number of small primitives, the VPC unit culls many primitives despite its limitations. The VPC unit also includes a cache for storing previously processed vertices in their transformed form, along with previously computed culling information. This increases the VPC unit throughput by reducing the number of memory accesses and culling operations to be performed. The setup unit performs culling operations on any general primitive that cannot be culled by the VPC unit. By performing a first series of culling operations in the VPC unit, the processing burden on the setup unit is decreased.
Source: USPTO / EPO open patent data. Objective bibliographic and citation counts.