US Patent 7612783 Advanced anti-aliasing with multiple graphics processing units

A method and apparatus for performing multisampling-based antialiasing in a system that includes first and second graphics processing unit (GPUs) that reduces the amount of data transferred between the GPUs and improves the efficiency with which such data is transferred. The first GPU renders a first version of a frame using a first multisampling pattern and the second GPU renders a second version of a frame in the second GPU using a second multisampling pattern. The second GPU identifies non-edge pixels in the second version of the frame. The pixels in the first version of the frame are then combined with only those pixels in the second version of the frame that have not been identified as non-edge pixels to generate a combined frame.