Programmable graphics processing engine

A fully programmable graphics processing engine is provided. The graphics processing engine includes three independent, programmable processors that run independent sets of instructions from independent instruction storage facilities. Graphics processing tasks may be distributed among the serially pipelined processors to allow for load balancing and parallel processing. The graphics processing engine may be a graphics co-processing core within a larger, general purpose computing system. Register files and storage units may be addressable by the system host processor. Each processor accepts incoming data for state or context updates. Each processor may execute a specific graphics processing function by executing a set of instructions when a predetermined memory address is accessed.