Advanced Micro Devices, Inc.
Data flow in a distributed graphics processing unit architecture

Abstract:

An apparatus includes a command buffer configured to temporarily store commands. The apparatus also includes processing units disposed at a substrate. The processing units are configured to access a plurality of copies of a command from the command buffer. The processing units include first processing units (such as fixed function hardware blocks) to perform geometry operations indicated by the command on a set of primitives. The geometry operations are performed concurrently by the first processing units. The processing units also include second processing units (such as shaders) to process mutually exclusive sets of pixels generated by rasterizing the set of primitives. The apparatus also includes a cache to temporarily store the pixels after shading by the shaders. The processing units stop or interrupt processing commands in response to detecting a synchronization point and resume processing the commands in response to all the processing units completing commands before synchronization point.