The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document.
The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge covers the following: Patent number, Date patent was issued, Date patent was filed, Title of the patent, Applicant, Inventor, Assignee, Attorney firm, Primary examiner, Assistant examiner, CPCs, and Abstract. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document (in Adobe Acrobat format, aka pdf). To download or print any patent click here.
Patent No.:
Date of Patent:
Jul. 11, 2000
Filed:
Apr. 30, 1998
Brian M Kelleher, Palo Alto, CA (US);
Thomas E Dewey, Redwood City, CA (US);
3D Labs, Inc., , GB;
Abstract
A scalable graphics processor architecture is disclosed in accordance with the present invention. In a first aspect, the architecture comprises a base graphics architecture. The architecture further includes an expansion graphic architecture, the expansion graphics architecture being mateably coupled to the base graphics architecture. In a second aspect, the architecture comprises a plurality of rendering processors, a first bus coupled to the plurality of processors for providing I/O signals to the processors; and a plurality of digital to analog converters (VDACs). In this aspect, each of the VDACs are adapted for driving a display. The architecture further includes a second bus coupled between the plurality of rendering processors and the plurality of VDACs for providing image data therebetween; and a switch, coupled to a plurality of processors. The switch selectively drives the rendering processors such that one of the plurality of the VDACs are driven by all of the rendering processors when the switch is in a first mode and the rendering processors drive all of the plurality of VDACs when the switch is in a second mode. Through the use of this architecture, the graphics processor system is expandable to allow more rendering processors to be added as well as allowing the processors to drive multiple VDACs or drive a single VDAC together.