Heuristics for improving performance in a tile-based architecture

A graphics processing pipeline, comprising:

• a world-space pipeline;
• a screen-space pipeline;
• and
• a tiling unit that couples the world-space pipeline to the screen-space pipeline, wherein the tiling unit is configured to:
• store, in a buffer, a first plurality of graphics primitives received from the world-space pipeline and a first plurality of state bundles associated with the first plurality of graphics primitives and received from the world-space pipeline;
• transmit the first plurality of graphics primitives to the screen-space pipeline for processing while a tiling function is enabled;
• store, in the buffer, a second plurality of graphics primitives received from the world-space pipeline and a second plurality of state bundles associated with the second plurality of graphics primitives and received from the world-space pipeline, wherein the second plurality of graphics primitives and the second plurality of state bundles are received from the world-space pipeline after the first plurality of graphics primitives and the first plurality of state bundles;
• determine, based on a first condition, that the tiling function should be disabled and that the second plurality of graphics primitives should be flushed from the buffer;
• and
• transmit the second plurality of graphics primitives to the screen-space pipeline for processing while the tiling function is disabled.

A computing device, comprising:

• a memory;
• and
• a graphics processing pipeline that includes:
• a world-space pipeline;
• a screen-space pipeline;
• and
• a tiling unit that couples the world-space pipeline to the screen-space pipeline, wherein the tiling unit is configured to:
• store, in a buffer, a first plurality of graphics primitives received from the world-space pipeline and a first plurality of state bundles associated with the first plurality of graphics primitives and received from the world-space pipeline;
• transmit the first plurality of graphics primitives to the screen-space pipeline for processing while a tiling function is enabled;
• store, in the buffer, a second plurality of graphics primitives received from the world-space pipeline and a second plurality of state bundles associated with the second plurality of graphics primitives and received from the world-space pipeline, wherein the second plurality of graphics primitives and the second plurality of state bundles are received from the world-space pipeline after the first plurality of graphics primitives and the first plurality of state bundles;
• determine, based on a first condition, that the tiling function should be disabled and that the second plurality of graphics primitives should be flushed from the buffer;
• and
• transmit the second plurality of graphics primitives to the screen-space pipeline for processing while the tiling function is disabled.