Datensynchronisation zwischen einer Mehrzahl von asynchronen Datenaufbereitungen

摘要

An apparatus for synchronising sets of data words rendered by a plurality of asynchronous data renderers includes a plurality of data registers 203, each data register receiving and temporarily storing a word of data in a first set of data words, from a corresponding one of the plurality of asynchronous data renderers. In addition, the apparatus includes a controller 200 that prevents each asynchronous data renderer from transferring a word of data, in a second set of data words, to its corresponding data register when the corresponding data register is storing its word of data, in the first set of data words. Further, the controller, when each of the plurality of data registers has received its word of data for the first set of data words, controls the plurality of data registers to output a synchronized set of data words. Thus, in a computer graphics system, words of data rendered by a rasterizer or scan converter, a texture mapping circuit, and a depth cueing circuit can be synchronized, on a per pixel basis, for each pixel of a primitive to be displayed on a display screen. In addition, each word of data for a pixel of a primitive, which is not to be blended, can be passed to a next stage in the processing pipeline of the graphics system, without a need to flush the processing pipeline.