Dynamic control of SIMDs

A system comprising:

• a graphics processing unit (GPU) configured to determine a condition related to the power consumption of the GPU, wherein the condition is based on any one or a combination of temperature, current, and processor activity;
• the GPU further configured to program a configuration register to disable one or more single instruction multiple data (SIMD) units in a shader pipeline in response to the determined condition;
• the GPU further configured to dynamically disable the one or more SIMD units in the shader pipeline based on the determined condition, wherein the dynamically disabling the one or more SIMD units includes providing dynamic medium grain clock gating to the one or more SIMD units and dynamic control of one or more clocks to each SIMD unit;
• and
• the GPU is further configured to assign one or more work threads to the one or more active SIMD units in the shader pipeline, wherein the work threads are assigned to one or more active SIMD units without having to flush the shader pipeline.

A non-transitory computer-readable medium that stores instructions adapted to be executed by a processor to:

• determine a condition related to the power consumption of the GPU, wherein the condition is based on any one or a combination of temperature, current, and processor activity;
• program a configuration register to disable one or more single instruction multiple data (SIMD) units in a shader pipeline in response to the determined condition;
• dynamically disable the one or more SIMD units in the shader pipeline based on the determined condition, wherein the dynamically disabling the one or more SIMD units includes providing dynamic medium grain clock gating to the one or more SIMD units and dynamic control of one or more clocks to each SIMD unit;
• and
• assign one or more work threads to one or more active SIMD units in the shader pipeline, wherein the work threads are assigned to the one or more active SIMD units without having to flush the shader pipeline.