JPH1055160A - Device and method performing window display of vga image - Google Patents

Abstract

PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To provide a display adaptor which uses only one merry for storing graphics images including VGA(video graphics array) images is used and also which has a VGA ability enabling the VGA images and accelerated graphics images to be simultaneously displayed. SOLUTION: This patent provides a device and a method performing the window display of VGA images on a display screen. This device is a graphics adaptor including a VGA controller 425, a rasterizer engine 420 and a frame buffer 430 having a display possible memory and a display impossible memory. The VGA controller stores VGA data in the display impossible memory of the frame buffer 430 and pulls out them from the memory and also supplies the data to the rasterizer engine 420 in order to process the data more so as to perform the window display of the VGA image on the display screen. After the processing, the acceleration type graphics processor of the rasterizer engine 420 stores the VGA data similarily with other graphics data in the display possible memory of the frame buffer 430 which are to be displayed later.

Description

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION

[0001]

FIELD OF THE INVENTION The present invention relates to graphics display adapters and, more particularly, to an adapter having the ability to display a video graphics array (VGA) image in a window.

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art High-performance accelerated graphics display adapters have been widely used in industry. as a result,
These adapters are gradually replacing VGA adapters as standard products. The accelerated graphics adapter has a dedicated processor for transmitting image information to the memory device. On the other hand, the VGA uses a processor of a system or a processor of a host computer to transmit image information to a memory device. With a dedicated processor, accelerated graphics adapters are faster and more efficient than VGAs.

However, given the existence of VGA applications, there is a strong desire in the industry to continuously supply VGA adapters. To meet this need, several display adapter manufacturers have designed accelerated graphics display adapters with VGA capability.
FIG. 1 shows an example of an accelerated graphics display adapter having such VGA capability. Graphics·
Adapter 100 includes an accelerated graphics controller 110 having a VGA port and an input port. The graphics controller 110 is connected to a frame buffer 130, which is further connected to a random access memory digital-to-analog converter (RAMDAC) 150. The RAMDAC 150 is connected to the display monitor 16
0 has a display port used to provide images. Further, the RAMDAC 150 also has a VGA port for receiving VGA image data. Also,
The graphics adapter 100 is a VGA port of the accelerated graphics controller 110, a RAMD
AC150 and Dynamic Random Access
It also has a VGA controller 120 connected to a memory (DRAM) 140.

[0004] The accelerated graphics data received from the input port of the graphics controller 110 is processed by the controller 110 and stored in the frame buffer 130. When the display of the data is ready, the data is sent to the RAMDAC 150 for final display on the monitor 160. Graphics·
The VGA data received by controller 110 is transmitted to VGA controller 120 via a VGA port for storage in DRAM 140. When the display of the data is ready, the VGA controller 120
Is extracted from the DRAM 140 by the RAMDAC
It is sent to the RAMDAC 150 via the VGA port of 150.

[0005] As shown in FIG. 1, these accelerated graphics adapters are two-portable for VGA compatibility.
Memory devices, frame buffer 130 and DRAM
140 is used. The use of these two memory devices causes an increase in the overall cost of the adapter.

[0006] For various reasons, users frequently desire to simultaneously display VGA images and accelerated images on a screen. In this case, each image is displayed in one window. However, the graphics adapter of FIG.
When the A image is displayed, the use of the graphics controller is not permitted. In particular, the use of a VGA controller specifies the operation of the RAMDAC 150. RAMDAC operation under VGA control is not compatible with RAMDAC operation under accelerated graphics control. Therefore, it was impossible to simultaneously display the VGA image and the accelerated image on one screen.

[0007]

In view of the above problems, it is an object of the present invention to use only one memory device for storing graphics images, including VGA images, and to use VGA images and accelerated graphics. It is an object of the present invention to provide a display adapter having a VGA capability capable of simultaneously displaying source images.

[0008]

In order to achieve the above object, the present invention provides an apparatus and a method for windowing a VGA image on a display screen. The device is a graphics adapter that includes a VGA controller, a rasterizer engine, and a frame buffer having displayable and non-displayable memory. The VGA controller stores and retrieves the VGA data in the non-displayable memory of the frame buffer and supplies the data to the rasterizer engine for further processing to display the VGA image in a window on the display screen. I do. After the processing, the accelerated graphics processor of the rasterizer engine, as well as other graphics data in the displayable memory of the frame buffer to be displayed later,
GA data is stored. The VGA image is refreshed after each full screen display on the monitor.

[0009]

FIG. 2 shows a block diagram of a digital computer 200 utilized in accordance with a preferred embodiment of the present invention. Computer 200 has one or more main processors 210 in a computer box 205,
The main processor 210 is connected to the main memory 220. Computer box 205 has one or more input devices 230 and output devices 240 attached to it. The input device 230 is, for example, a keyboard, a mouse, a tablet, or the like, or other types of input devices can be used. Output device 240 is a text monitor, plotter, or the like, or other types of output devices are available.
The main processor 210 is also connected via a graphics adapter 300 to a graphics output device 310 such as a graphics display. Graphics adapter 300 is in adapter slot 26
0A is provided. Graphics Adapter 3
00 receives an instruction regarding graphics from the main processor 210 via the bus 250. Modem or other communication adapter 350 and hard disk 355
Are also provided in the slots 260C and 260D, respectively.
The communication with the main processor 210 is performed through the bus 250. Modem 350 can communicate with another data processing system 370 via communication line 360. Main memory 22
0, hard disk 355 and floppy disk (not shown) will simply be referred to as memory.

[0010] The present invention provides a graphics adapter 300.
Will be implemented within. FIG. 3 is a block diagram showing a part of the graphics adapter 300 described in FIG.
These parts include an address decoder 480 connected to the rasterizer engine 420 and the VGA controller 425. The rasterizer engine 420 and the VGA controller 425 are connected to each other. Address decoder 480 is used to transmit data to either rasterizer engine 420 or VGA controller 425. Address decoders are well-known and, therefore, a description of their implementation is omitted. Rasterizer engine 420 should be updated every pixel to provide a particular image data, and how to update or to determine that pixel to produce a visually accurate display. The VGA controller 425 updates the VGA memory with the image data from the processor 210. Graphics adapter 300 also includes a frame buffer 430. Frame buffer 430 includes displayable memory 432 and non-displayable memory 434. The frame buffer 430 is a rasterizer engine 420
It is connected to the. The VGA controller 425 is a VGA
The non-displayable memory 434 is used to store data. The displayable memory 432 further includes a RAMDAC 44
Connect to 0.

Usually, the graphics system is 1024 ×
If designed to display 768 or 768 Kbytes of data, this frame buffer is provided with a storage capacity of 1024 Kbytes of data. A storage capacity of 768 Kbytes is used to contain the data to be finally displayed, which is referred to as displayable memory. 256K remaining
The byte storage capacity is not used to hold the data to be displayed, and is referred to as a non-displayable memory. twenty five
Since 6K bytes of storage capacity are often not used for any purpose, they are usually wasted. The present invention is VG
This storage capacity is effectively used for storing the A image data, and another memory device for storing the data is not required. However, although the present invention has been described as using a system designed to display 768 Kbytes of data, systems designed to display image data of different sizes may be used. For example, a system designed to display 1280 Kbytes of image data uses a frame buffer having a storage capacity of 2048 Kbytes. The unused 768 Kbytes of the frame buffer are available as VGA memory.

A conventional VGA memory device (DRAM) is usually divided into four mappings. Each mapping is used to hold different information about the image. For example, in text mode, the first mapping holds character code information, the second mapping holds attribute information,
The third mapping holds font information and the fourth mapping is typically used only in graphics mode.
Similarly, non-displayable memory 434 is divided into four memory mappings to hold different information about the VGA image. The undisplayable part of the frame buffer is 4
Can be physically divided into two mappings,
In this case, it is virtually divided into a plurality of mappings.
That is, the VGA controller uses an addressing scheme that effectively uses the memory as four different mappings. The VGA map data is merged into a single access of memory 434 for effective transmission.

In operation, when the main processor 210 sends data to the graphics adapter 300, an address decoder 480 decodes the address and
Decide whether to send the data to the rasterizer engine 420 or to the VGA controller 425. V
The data sent to the GA controller 425 is processed by the VGA controller and sent to the non-displayable memory 434 for storage. Similarly, data sent to rasterizer engine 420 is processed and sent to displayable memory 432 for storage. When the VGA data is ready to be displayed, the VGA controller 425 retrieves the data from the non-displayable memory 434, processes the data as needed to create an image, and sends it to the rasterizer engine 420. Rasterizer engine 42
0 sends the VGA data to the memory 432 and creates a composite image of the VGA image and the image created by itself. The rasterizer engine 420 is supplied by the main processor 210 of FIG. 2 with the starting address of the VGA image window in its composite image. The VGA image data is mapped from the start address to the displayable memory 432, and its size is defined by the VGA operation mode.
If desired, the VGA image can also be sized to match the final screen resolution created for display 470. The processed data is stored in the displayable memory 4.
32. When the data in the displayable memory 432 is ready to be displayed, it is sent to the display 470 via the RAMDAC 440.

The image data in the displayable memory 432 is displayed on a display monitor 470 in a raster scanning system. That is, the image is displayed by sweeping the modulated electron beam line by line over the entire display area of the display monitor 470 with a scanner. Thus, image data corresponding to the top left pixel of the monitor is provided first, and data corresponding to the bottom right pixel is provided last. When the bottom right pixel is reached, the beam is turned off so as not to display the pixel until it returns to the top left pixel location on the monitor (direct blank). At the beginning of a vertical blank, VGA controller 425 begins reading data from non-displayable memory 434 and sends it to rasterizer engine 420 for processing. Rasterizer engine 420 processes the data and stores it in displayable memory 432. In this way, a VGA image is created in the memory 432 before the raster scanning process of the display 470 starts. This is display 4
Synchronizes the display of 70 with the VGA image generation, so that the image is only partially completed when the memory is scanned for image display (ie, partly new and partly previous) Avoid the situation. It should be noted that the accelerated data in the displayable memory 432 is
0 means that each time accelerated graphics data is sent to the graphics adapter, it is refreshed.

FIG. 4 shows a detailed block diagram of an apparatus for displaying a plurality of windows on a display monitor. The device includes a frame buffer 520, a window identification device (WID) 530, and a RAMDAC 540.
Has a graphics processor 510 connected to it. RAMDAC 540 is also connected to WID 530 and frame buffer 520. A graphics processor 510 included in the rasterizer engine 420 of FIG. 3 sends data to be displayed (both VGA and accelerated graphics) to a frame buffer 520 over a data bus 570. Graphics processor 510 also sends the address information of the transmitted data to WID 530 via address bus 580.
The color palette of the look-up table (LUT) 545 is updated by the graphics processor 510 via the control bus 560.

WID 530 and frame buffer 5
The 20 displayable memories are similarly mapped. That is,
Each location in WID 530 corresponds to a pixel location in displayable memory. WID 530 is a RAM to determine the attributes of the corresponding pixel, such as the color intensity of the pixel.
Generate code to be used by DAC 540. RA
The MDAC 540 uses these attributes to correctly interpret data for a particular window, such as bits per pixel, palette address, and the like. Therefore, the accelerated image data and the VGA image data can be simultaneously displayed on the display monitor in each window. For example,
8 bits of VGA data per pixel
It can be displayed together with a 6-bit accelerated image.

While the present invention has been described with reference to particular embodiments, other embodiments will be apparent to those skilled in the art. Therefore, the above description does not limit the scope of the invention, which is defined by the appended claims.

In summary, the following matters are disclosed regarding the configuration of the present invention.

(1) Processes graphics image data including VGA image data, stores the processed graphics image data in a display memory, and simultaneously outputs each image data of a plurality of graphics images indicated by the graphics image data to a display monitor. V. having a rasterizer engine for displaying in each window.
Graphics display adapter that can display GA images in a window. (2) The graphics display adapter according to (1), wherein the display memory has a displayable memory portion and a non-displayable memory portion. (3) The graphics display adapter according to (2), wherein the non-displayable memory portion is divided into four mappings for storing information data for a VGA image. (4) The graphic according to (3), further comprising a VGA controller for storing, processing, and retrieving VGA image data from the non-displayable memory portion. Display adapter. (5) VG extracted from the non-displayable memory part
The graphics display adapter according to (4), wherein the A image data is stored in a displayable memory of the frame buffer and provided to the rasterizer engine for window display on the screen. . (6) The graphics display adapter according to (5), wherein the VGA image data is provided to the rasterizer engine by the VGA controller after each full screen display. (7) The graphics display adapter according to (6), wherein the VGA image is adjusted in size by the rasterizer engine to match a final screen resolution. (8) obtaining and processing graphics image data including VGA image data; and storing the graphics image data in a display memory.
Displaying a plurality of said graphics image data simultaneously in respective windows of one display monitor at the same time.
How to display image data in a window. (9) The display memory has a displayable memory portion and a non-displayable memory portion,
The method according to the above (8). (10) The method according to (9), wherein the non-displayable memory portion is divided into four mappings, and each mapping stores information data for one VGA image. (11) The method according to (10), further comprising the step of storing, processing, and retrieving VGA image data from the non-displayable memory portion by a VGA controller. (12) VG extracted from the non-displayable memory part
The image data according to (11), wherein the A image data is stored in a displayable memory of the display memory and supplied to a rasterizer engine for display on the screen of one window. Method. (13) VGA image data is displayed after each full screen display,
The method according to (12), wherein the data is supplied to the rasterizer engine by the VGA controller. (14) The method according to (13), wherein the VGA image is sized by the rasterizer engine to match a final screen resolution.

[0020]

As described above, the present invention uses only one memory device to store graphics images including VGA images, and enables VGA images and accelerated graphics images to be displayed simultaneously. Provide a cost-effective display adapter with capabilities.

[Brief description of the drawings]

FIG. 1 is a block diagram of a conventional accelerated graphics adapter having VGA capability.

FIG. 2 is a block diagram of a digital computer utilized in accordance with a preferred embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 3 is a partial block diagram of a graphics adapter.

FIG. 4 is a detailed block diagram of the apparatus used to display in multiple windows of the display monitor.

[Explanation of symbols]

 100 Graphics Adapter 110 Accelerated Graphics Controller 120 VGA Controller 130 Display Memory 140 DRAM 150 RAMDAC 160 Display 200 Digital Computer 205 Computer Box 210 Main Processor 220 Main Memory 230 Input Device 240 Output Device 250 Bus 260A Adapter Slot 260C Slot 260D Slot 300 Graphics Adapter 310 Graphics Output Device 350 Modem 355 Hard Disk 360 Communication Line 370 Other Data Processing System 420 Rasterizer Engine 425 VGA Controller 430 Frame Buffer 432 Displayable Memory 434 Nondisplayable Memory 470 Display 4 80 Address Decoder 510 Graphics Processor 520 Frame Buffer 530 Window Identifier 540 RAMDAC

 ──────────────────────────────────────────────────の Continued on front page (72) Inventor Gary Allen Neil United States 78726, Waterton Parke Cove, Austin, Texas 12402 (72) Inventor John Thomas Roberson United States 78759, Texas, Ohio Stin, Arrowpoint Cove 6809

Claims (14)

[Claims] Processing graphics image data, including VGA image data, storing the graphics image data in a display memory;
A VGA image can be window-displayed, comprising a rasterizer engine for simultaneously displaying each image data of a plurality of graphics images represented by the graphics image data in respective windows of a display monitor. Graphics display adapter. 2. The graphics display adapter according to claim 1, wherein said display memory has a displayable memory portion and a non-displayable memory portion. 3. The non-displayable memory portions are each VGA.
3. The graphics display adapter according to claim 2, wherein the graphics display adapter is divided into four mappings for storing information data for images. 4. The apparatus of claim 3, further comprising a VGA controller for storing, processing, and retrieving VGA image data from said non-displayable memory portion. Graphics display adapter. 5. The VGA image data retrieved from the non-displayable memory portion is stored in a displayable memory of the frame buffer, and provided to the rasterizer engine for window display on the screen. The graphics display adapter according to claim 4, wherein 6. The graphics display adapter according to claim 5, wherein VGA image data is provided to said rasterizer engine by said VGA controller after each full screen display. 7. The graphics display adapter according to claim 6, wherein said VGA image is sized by said rasterizer engine to match a final screen resolution. 8. A method for obtaining and processing graphics image data including VGA image data, storing the graphics image data in a display memory, and simultaneously storing a plurality of the graphics image data in one at a time. Displaying in respective windows of a display monitor.
A method for displaying GA image data in a window. 9. The method of claim 8, wherein said display memory has a displayable memory portion and a non-displayable memory portion. 10. The method of claim 9, wherein said non-displayable memory portion is divided into four mappings, each mapping storing information data for one VGA image. 11. The method of claim 10, further comprising the step of storing, processing, and retrieving VGA image data from said non-displayable memory portion by a VGA controller. . 12. The VGA image data retrieved from the non-displayable memory portion is supplied to a rasterizer engine for storage in the displayable memory of the display memory and display on the screen of one window. The method of claim 11, wherein: 13. The VGA controller supplies VGA image data to the rasterizer engine after each full screen display.
The method described in. 14. The method of claim 1, wherein said VGA image is sized by said rasterizer engine to match a final screen resolution.
3. The method according to 3.