Importance

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Abstract

A method and apparatus for managing texture mapping data in a computer graphics system, the computer graphics system including a host computer, primitive rendering hardware and a primitive data path extending between the host computer and the primitive rendering hardware. The host computer passes primitives to be rendered by the system to the primitive rendering hardware over the primitive data path. The host computer has a main memory that stores texture mapping data corresponding to the primitives to be rendered. The primitive rendering hardware includes a local texture memory that locally stores the texture mapping data corresponding to at least one of the primitives to be rendered. When a primitive passed to the primitive rendering hardware is to be rendered, a determination is made as to whether its corresponding texture mapping data is in the local texture memory. When the texture mapping data corresponding to the primitive to be rendered is in the local texture memory, the primitive is rendered using its corresponding texture mapping data from the local texture memory. When the texture mapping data corresponding to the primitive to be rendered is not in the local texture memory, the texture mapping data corresponding to the primitive to be rendered is downloaded from the host computer main memory to the primitive rendering hardware, and the primitive is rendered using its corresponding texture mapping data downloaded from the main memory. The local texture memory may be implemented as a cache.

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