Eliminating the Z-Buffer bottleneck

Authors:
G. Knittel;A. Schilling
Affiliations:
WSI/GRIS, University of Tübingen, Germany;WSI/GRIS, University of Tübingen, Germany
Venue:
EDTC '95 Proceedings of the 1995 European conference on Design and Test
Year:
1995

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Abstract

We present a solution to one of the fundamental problems in computer graphics, the hidden surface removal. In most 3D-graphics systems the hidden surface removal is done using the Z-Buffer algorithm. This method, however, requires one to perform a read-modify-write memory access for each visible pixel, which represents a severe performance limit. We introduce a novel SRAM cell, which incorporates the needed logical units to perform the Z-Buffer algorithm on its own. Placed into the page register of conventional DRAMs, almost any pixel rate can be achieved.