Collaborative Graphic Rendering for Improving Visual Experience

Handheld devices such as UMPC, though convenient, bear weakness of size constraint for display. To mitigate such a problem and enhance user experience for owners of small devices, in this paper we design a collaborative rendering platform. When running game graphic applications at a handheld, the generated OpenGL graphic commands are intercepted and then delivered to a device with a larger display. The graphics are rendered and displayed at that device. The performance of the collaborative rendering platform is determined by graphic computing resources and network bandwidth. Analysis and simulation prove that other than providing a better display, the collaborative system can improve game experience also by increasing frame rates. In particular, at a low computing cost, a further collaboration between GPUs of collaborators can improve frame rate by eliminating the negative impact from network delay on applications that require GPU feedback.