Upstream Lossy Compression for Display Surface Bandwidth Reduction
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Solution Overview
Problem
Current data processing systems face challenges in reducing bandwidth and power requirements while maintaining image quality, as existing compression techniques do not fully optimize the compression of pixel data across processing stages.
Innovation Solution
Implementing a lossy compression scheme upstream of the display controller, where processing stages compress and provide surfaces in a compressed form, reducing memory bandwidth and power requirements without adversely affecting image quality.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Loss of energy
If lossy compression is applied at the display controller stage only, then bandwidth and power are reduced, but image quality may be degraded and compression efficiency is limited
Solution Approach 1:
The patent applies compression preprocessing at upstream processing stages before the display controller stage. By performing lossy compression earlier in the pipeline, the system reduces the amount of data that needs to be processed and transmitted downstream, achieving better overall compression efficiency while maintaining final image quality through selective application of compression at appropriate stages.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent divides the compression process into multiple segments applied at different processing stages. Different regions or surfaces can be compressed at different stages depending on their requirements, allowing optimized compression strategies for different parts of the image data while managing the trade-off between compression efficiency and image quality preservation.
2Quantity of substance
If compression is applied at upstream processing stages, then memory bandwidth and power requirements are reduced, but system complexity increases
Solution Approach 1:
The patent integrates compression functionality into existing upstream processing stages that already perform image processing tasks. By making these stages multi-functional (performing both processing and compression), the system reduces memory bandwidth requirements without adding separate dedicated compression hardware, thus limiting the increase in system complexity.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent merges the compression function with existing processing stages in the image pipeline. Instead of adding independent compression modules, the compression operations are combined with the processing operations already performed at these stages, reducing the need for additional components and simplifying the overall system architecture.
Data Source
AI summary
A data processing system 1 comprises a display controller operable to provide to a display a compressed version of an output surface to be displayed that has been compressed using a lossy compression scheme, and one or more processing stages operable to provide a surface or surfaces that are to be used when forming an output surface to be displayed. At least one of the one or more processing stages is operable to output one or more regions of the surface or surfaces that it provides to be used when forming an output surface to be displayed in a compressed form using a lossy compression scheme.