| Patent application number | Description | Published |
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| 20080244287 | Platform communication protocol - A host chipset heartbeat may be utilized, in some embodiments, to handle interrupts from external devices on a power efficient basis. The availability of the host chipset heartbeat may be signaled to external devices and those external devices may time their activities to a period of time when not only are resources available, but the assertion of the activity is advantageous because the host chipset is already transitioning from a lower power consumption state. | 10-02-2008 |
| 20080263248 | Multi-drop extension for a communication protocol - In one embodiment, the present invention includes an apparatus having an upstream component including a plurality of virtual bridges to control communication with a corresponding plurality of endpoint components coupled downstream of the upstream component and a shared port. The apparatus may further include a first endpoint component coupled to the upstream component via a first link and a second endpoint component coupled to the first endpoint component via a second link and to the upstream component via a third link, where the upstream component and the endpoint components are coupled in a daisy chain topology. Other embodiments are described and claimed. | 10-23-2008 |
| 20090041099 | LINK INTERFACE TECHNIQUE INCLUDING DATA INDICATOR SYMBOLS - In some embodiments, a chip includes transmitters and generation circuitry to provide data symbols and special characters to the transmitters to be transmitted. The chip also includes match detection circuitry to detect when the data symbols match the special characters; and indicator symbol generation circuitry to create data indicator symbols in response to detected matches and to provide the data indicator symbols to the generation circuitry to be provided to the transmitters to be transmitted. Other embodiments are described. | 02-12-2009 |
| 20100014541 | Managing timing of a protocol stack - In one embodiment, the present invention includes a method for receiving a communication in a protocol stack coupled to a tunneling interconnect, determining whether a communication type is subject to altered timing to accommodate a delay associated with the tunneling interconnect, adjusting a timing of at least one stack logic to accommodate the delay, and handling the communication using the adjusted timing. Other embodiments are described and claimed. | 01-21-2010 |
| 20100017549 | MECHANISM TO FLEXIBLY SUPPORT MULTIPLE DEVICE NUMBERS ON POINT-TO-POINT INTERCONNECT UPSTREAM PORTS - A method and apparatus for supporting multiple device numbers on point-to-point interconnect upstream ports. In one embodiment, the method includes a downstream component (DC) that performs discovery of internal device components of the DC during initialization of the DC. Subsequent to the discovery of internal devices of the DC, the DC may issue a multiple device number (MDN) request to an upstream component (UC) of the DC. In one embodiment, the MDN request may include an indication that the DC supports a “multiple device number capability,” as well as a quantity of the internal device components of the DC. The DC may receive an acknowledgement MDN from the UC to indicate a quantity of device numbers allocated to the DC. Subsequently, the DC may assign device numbers to the internal device components of the DC according to configuration requests received from the UC. Other embodiments are described and claimed. | 01-21-2010 |
| 20100080272 | Platform communication protocol - A host chipset heartbeat may be utilized, in some embodiments, to handle interrupts from external devices on a power efficient basis. The availability of the host chipset heartbeat may be signaled to external devices and those external devices may time their activities to a period of time when not only are resources available, but the assertion of the activity is advantageous because the host chipset is already transitioning from a lower power consumption state. | 04-01-2010 |
| 20100191920 | Providing Address Range Coherency Capability To A Device - In one embodiment, the present invention includes a method for receiving a memory request from a device coupled to an input/output (IO) interconnect, accessing a mapping table associated with the IO interconnect to determine if an address range including an address of the memory request is coherent, and if so, sending the memory request and a coherency indicator to indicate the coherent state of data at the address, otherwise sending the memory request and the coherency indicator to indicate a non-coherent state. Other embodiments are described and claimed. | 07-29-2010 |
| 20100250792 | OPPORTUNISTIC IMPROVEMENT OF MMIO REQUEST HANDLING BASED ON TARGET REPORTING OF SPACE REQUIREMENTS - Methods and apparatus for opportunistic improvement of Memory Mapped Input/Output (MMIO) request handling (e.g., based on target reporting of space requirements) are described. In one embodiment, logic in a processor may detect one or more bits in a message that is to be transmitted from an input/output (I/O) device. The one or more bits may indicate memory mapped I/O (MMIO) information corresponding to one or more attributes of the I/O device. Other embodiments are also disclosed. | 09-30-2010 |
| 20100318693 | Delegating A Poll Operation To Another Device - In one embodiment, the present invention includes a method for handling a registration message received from a host processor, where the registration message delegates a poll operation with respect to a device from the host processor to another component. Information from the message may be stored in a poll table, and the component may send a read request to poll the device and report a result of the poll to the host processor based on a state of the device. Other embodiments are described and claimed. | 12-16-2010 |
| 20100329285 | MECHANISM FOR CLOCK SYNCHRONIZATION - A method and apparatus for synchronizing time between a master device and a target device arranged across a network, wherein the target device communicates to the master device through a PCIe interconnect includes transmitting a first message at a first time from the master device to the target device, the first message including a message indicator; and receiving a reply message at a subsequent time from the target device to the master device, the reply message including the message indicator. | 12-30-2010 |
| 20110047395 | Platform Communication Protocol - A host chipset heartbeat may be utilized, in some embodiments, to handle interrupts from external devices on a power efficient basis. The availability of the host chipset heartbeat may be signaled to external devices and those external devices may time their activities to a period of time when not only are resources available, but the assertion of the activity is advantageous because the host chipset is already transitioning from a lower power consumption state. | 02-24-2011 |
| 20120030387 | MECHANISM TO FLEXIBLY SUPPORT MULTIPLE DEVICE NUMBERS ON POINT-TO-POINT INTERCONNECT UPSTREAM PORTS - A method and apparatus for supporting multiple device numbers on point-to-point interconnect upstream ports. In one embodiment, the method includes a downstream component (DC) that performs discovery of internal device components of the DC during initialization of the DC. Subsequent to the discovery of internal devices of the DC, the DC may issue a multiple device number (MDN) request to an upstream component (UC) of the DC. In one embodiment, the MDN request may include an indication that the DC supports a “multiple device number capability,” as well as a quantity of the internal device components of the DC. The DC may receive an acknowledgement MDN from the UC to indicate a quantity of device numbers allocated to the DC. Subsequently, the DC may assign device numbers to the internal device components of the DC according to configuration requests received from the UC. Other embodiments are described and claimed. | 02-02-2012 |
| 20120068735 | INCORPORATING AN INDEPENDENT LOGIC BLOCK IN A SYSTEM-ON-A-CHIP - In one embodiment, the present invention includes a logic having a first link interface to enable communication with an intellectual property (IP) logic adapted on a single semiconductor die with the logic, where the IP logic includes a second link interface coupled to the first link interface via an on-die interconnect. In this way, the IP logic can be unmodified with respect to a standalone device having the IP logic incorporated therein. Other embodiments are described and claimed. | 03-22-2012 |
| 20120078690 | POWER ALLOCATION CONTROLLER - Methods and systems may include an apparatus having a power line interface and a controller with management logic. The management logic can manage the power delivery policies of devices connected to the power line interface based on changes in the power delivery capability of the apparatus. | 03-29-2012 |
| 20120300085 | ASYMMETRIC LINK FOR STREAMING APPLICATIONS - Systems and methods of supporting video streaming operations may involve transmitting a pulse width modulated (PWM) control signal to an imaging device, wherein the imaging devices identifies control data based on a duty cycle of the control signal. The imaging device can configure a video stream based on the control data and synchronize transmission of the video stream based on a frequency of the control signal. | 11-29-2012 |
| 20130007483 | METHOD AND APPARATUS TO REDUCE IDLE LINK POWER IN A PLATFORM - A method and apparatus to reduce the idle link power in a platform. In one embodiment of the invention, the host and its coupled endpoint(s) in the platform each has a low power idle link state that allows disabling of the high speed link circuitry in both the host and its coupled endpoint(s). This allows the platform to reduce its idle power as both the host and its coupled endpoint(s) are able to turn off their high speed link circuitry in one embodiment of the invention. | 01-03-2013 |
| 20130013829 | MECHANISM TO FLEXIBLY SUPPORT MULTIPLE DEVICE NUMBERS ON POINT-TO-POINT INTERCONNECT UPSTREAM PORTS - A method and apparatus for supporting multiple device numbers on point-to-point interconnect upstream ports. In one embodiment, the method includes a downstream component (DC) that performs discovery of internal device components of the DC during initialization of the DC. Subsequent to the discovery of internal devices of the DC, the DC may issue a multiple device number (MDN) request to an upstream component (UC) of the DC. In one embodiment, the MDN request may include an indication that the DC supports a “multiple device number capability,” as well as a quantity of the internal device components of the DC. The DC may receive an acknowledgement MDN from the UC to indicate a quantity of device numbers allocated to the DC. Subsequently, the DC may assign device numbers to the internal device components of the DC according to configuration requests received from the UC. Other embodiments are described and claimed. | 01-10-2013 |
| 20130091317 | PCI EXPRESS ENHANCEMENTS AND EXTENSIONS - A method and apparatus for enhancing/extending a serial point-to-point interconnect architecture, such as Peripheral Component Interconnect Express (PCIe) is herein described. Temporal and locality caching hints and prefetching hints are provided to improve system wide caching and prefetching. Message codes for atomic operations to arbitrate ownership between system devices/resources are included to allow efficient access/ownership of shared data. Loose transaction ordering provided for while maintaining corresponding transaction priority to memory locations to ensure data integrity and efficient memory access. Active power sub-states and setting thereof is included to allow for more efficient power management. And, caching of device local memory in a host address space, as well as caching of system memory in a device local memory address space is provided for to improve bandwidth and latency for memory accesses. | 04-11-2013 |
| 20130097353 | PCI EXPRESS ENHANCEMENTS AND EXTENSIONS - A method and apparatus for enhancing/extending a serial point-to-point interconnect architecture, such as Peripheral Component Interconnect Express (PCIe) is herein described. Temporal and locality caching hints and prefetching hints are provided to improve system wide caching and prefetching. Message codes for atomic operations to arbitrate ownership between system devices/resources are included to allow efficient access/ownership of shared data. Loose transaction ordering provided for while maintaining corresponding transaction priority to memory locations to ensure data integrity and efficient memory access. Active power sub-states and setting thereof is included to allow for more efficient power management. And, caching of device local memory in a host address space, as well as caching of system memory in a device local memory address space is provided for to improve bandwidth and latency for memory accesses. | 04-18-2013 |
| 20130111086 | PCI EXPRESS ENHANCEMENTS AND EXTENSIONS | 05-02-2013 |
| 20130117492 | PLATFORM COMMUNICATION PROTOCOL - A host chipset heartbeat may be utilized, in some embodiments, to handle interrupts from external devices on a power efficient basis. The availability of the host chipset heartbeat may be signaled to external devices and those external devices may time their activities to a period of time when not only are resources available, but the assertion of the activity is advantageous because the host chipset is already transitioning from a lower power consumption state. | 05-09-2013 |
| 20130132622 | PCI EXPRESS ENHANCEMENTS AND EXTENSIONS - A method and apparatus forenhancing/extending a serial point-to-point interconnect architecture, such as Peripheral Component Interconnect Express (PCIe) is herein described. Temporal and locality caching hints and prefetching hints are provided to improve system wide caching and prefetching. Message codes for atomic operations to arbitrate ownership between system devices/resources are included to allow efficient access/ownership of shared data. Loose transaction ordering provided for while maintaining corresponding transaction priority to memory locations to ensure data integrity and efficient memory access. Active power sub-states and setting thereof is included to allow for more efficient power management. And, caching of device local memory in a host address space, as well as caching of system memory in a device local memory address space is provided for to improve bandwidth and latency for memory accesses. | 05-23-2013 |
| 20130132636 | PCI EXPRESS ENHANCEMENTS AND EXTENSIONS - A method and apparatus for enhancing/extending a serial point-to-point interconnect architecture, such as Peripheral Component Interconnect Express (PCIe) is herein described. Temporal and locality caching hints and prefetching hints are provided to improve system wide caching and prefetching. Message codes for atomic operations to arbitrate ownership between system devices/resources are included to allow efficient access/ownership of shared data. Loose transaction ordering provided for while maintaining corresponding transaction priority to memory locations to ensure data integrity and efficient memory access. Active power sub-states and setting thereof is included to allow for more efficient power management. And, caching of device local memory in a host address space, as well as caching of system memory in a device local memory address space is provided for to improve bandwidth and latency for memory accesses. | 05-23-2013 |
| 20130132683 | PCI EXPRESS ENHANCEMENTS AND EXTENSIONS - A method and apparatus forenhancing/extending a serial point-to-point interconnect architecture, such as Peripheral Component Interconnect Express (PCIe) is herein described. Temporal and locality caching hints and prefetching hints are provided to improve system wide caching and prefetching. Message codes for atomic operations to arbitrate ownership between system devices/resources are included to allow efficient access/ownership of shared data. Loose transaction ordering provided for while maintaining corresponding transaction priority to memory locations to ensure data integrity and efficient memory access. Active power sub-states and setting thereof is included to allow for more efficient power management. And, caching of device local memory in a host address space, as well as caching of system memory in a device local memory address space is provided for to improve bandwidth and latency for memory accesses. | 05-23-2013 |
| 20130138843 | DELEGATING A POLL OPERATION TO ANOTHER DEVICE - In one embodiment, the present invention includes a method for handling a registration message received from a host processor, where the registration message delegates a poll operation with respect to a device from the host processor to another component. Information from the message may be stored in a poll table, and the component may send a read request to poll the device and report a result of the poll to the host processor based on a state of the device. Other embodiments are described and claimed. | 05-30-2013 |
| 20130205053 | PCI EXPRESS TUNNELING OVER A MULTI-PROTOCOL I/O INTERCONNECT - Described are embodiments of methods, apparatuses, and systems for PCIe tunneling across a multi-protocol I/O interconnect of a computer apparatus. A method for PCIe tunneling across the multi-protocol I/O interconnect may include establishing a first communication path between ports of a switching fabric of a multi-protocol I/O interconnect of a computer apparatus in response to a peripheral component interconnect express (PCIe) device being connected to the computer apparatus, and establishing a second communication path between the switching fabric and a PCIe controller. The method may further include routing, by the multi-protocol I/O interconnect, PCIe protocol packets of the PCIe device from the PCIe device to the PCIe controller over the first and second communication paths. Other embodiments may be described and claimed. | 08-08-2013 |
| 20130262731 | SUPERSPEED INTER-CHIP COMMUNICATIONS - An interface for low power, high bandwidth communications between units in a device in provided herein. The interface comprises a USB 3.0 system interface and a SuperSpeed inter-chip (SSIC) protocol adaptor configured to facilitate communications between the USB 3.0 system interface and an M-PHY interface. | 10-03-2013 |
| 20130318264 | Optimized Link Training And Management Mechanism - In one embodiment, a converged protocol stack can be used to unify communications from a first communication protocol to a second communication protocol to provide for data transfer across a physical interconnect. This stack can be incorporated in an apparatus that includes a protocol stack for a first communication protocol including transaction and link layers, and a physical (PHY) unit coupled to the protocol stack to provide communication between the apparatus and a device coupled to the apparatus via a physical link. This PHY unit may include a physical unit circuit according to the second communication protocol. Other embodiments are described and claimed. | 11-28-2013 |
| 20130318279 | Providing A Load/Store Communication Protocol With A Low Power Physical Unit - In one embodiment, a converged protocol stack can be used to unify communications from a first communication protocol to a second communication protocol to provide for data transfer across a physical interconnect. This stack can be incorporated in an apparatus that includes a protocol stack for a first communication protocol including transaction and link layers, and a physical (PHY) unit coupled to the protocol stack to provide communication between the apparatus and a device coupled to the apparatus via a physical link. This PHY unit may include a physical unit circuit according to the second communication protocol. Other embodiments are described and claimed. | 11-28-2013 |
| 20130346635 | Assigning Addresses To Devices On An Interconnect - In one embodiment, the present invention includes an apparatus having a random number generator to generate a random number responsive to a first command from a host controller and a logic to generate a device identifier for the apparatus. The apparatus can provide a reply to the host controller including the random number responsive to an identification request from the host controller corresponding to the device identifier. Other embodiments are described and claimed. | 12-26-2013 |
| 20130346656 | Providing A Serial Protocol For A Bidirectional Serial Interconnect - In one embodiment, the present invention includes a host controller with transmit logic to prepare data into a data packet for communication along an interconnect and to transmit the data packet. This data packet may include a preamble portion having a first predetermined value, a content portion including the data and having a plurality of symbols each including a start bit separate from the data, an error detection portion including an inverted version of the content portion, and a postamble portion having a second predetermined value. Other embodiments are described and claimed. | 12-26-2013 |
| 20140068135 | Providing A Consolidated Sideband Communication Channel Between Devices - In an embodiment, the present invention includes a protocol stack having a transaction layer and a link layer. In addition a first physical (PHY) unit is coupled to the protocol stack to provide communication between a processor and a device coupled to the processor via a physical link, where the first PHY unit is of a low power communication protocol and includes a first physical unit circuit. In turn, a second PHY unit is coupled to the protocol stack to provide communication between the processor and the device via a sideband channel coupled between the multicore processor and the device separate from the physical link, where the second PHY unit includes a second physical unit circuit. Other embodiments are described and claimed. | 03-06-2014 |
| 20140070846 | Interface Circuitry For A Test Apparatus - In one embodiment, a test apparatus includes a field programmable gate array (FPGA) including a first transmitter to communicate first signals according to current mode logic (CML) signaling and a first receiver to receive second signals according to the CML signaling, and an interface circuit to couple the FPGA to a device that is to communicate according to voltage mode signaling. The interface circuit may adapt the first signals communicated by the first transmitter according to the CML signaling to voltage mode signaling signals for receipt by the device. Other embodiments are described and claimed. | 03-13-2014 |
| 20140108686 | Optimized Link Training And Management Mechanism - In one embodiment, a converged protocol stack can be used to unify communications from a first communication protocol to a second communication protocol to provide for data transfer across a physical interconnect. This stack can be incorporated in an apparatus that includes a protocol stack for a first communication protocol including transaction and link layers, and a physical (PHY) unit coupled to the protocol stack to provide communication between the apparatus and a device coupled to the apparatus via a physical link. This PHY unit may include a physical unit circuit according to the second communication protocol. Other embodiments are described and claimed. | 04-17-2014 |
| 20140133499 | COMMUNICATING A MESSAGE REQUEST TRANSACTION TO A LOGICAL DEVICE - A general input/output communication port implements a communication stack that includes a physical layer, a data link layer and a transaction layer. The transaction layer includes logic to generate a signal that relates to a transaction involving a memory and includes a type field, an address field, and at least one field to indicate that another field of the signal is to include information. | 05-15-2014 |
| 20140173164 | Providing A Load/Store Communication Protocol With A Low Power Physical Unit - In one embodiment, a converged protocol stack can be used to unify communications from a first communication protocol to a second communication protocol to provide for data transfer across a physical interconnect. This stack can be incorporated in an apparatus that includes a protocol stack for a first communication protocol including transaction and link layers, and a physical (PHY) unit coupled to the protocol stack to provide communication between the apparatus and a device coupled to the apparatus via a physical link. This PHY unit may include a physical unit circuit according to the second communication protocol. Other embodiments are described and claimed. | 06-19-2014 |
| 20140281062 | APPARATUS, SYSTEM AND METHOD FOR PROVIDING ACCESS TO A DEVICE FUNCTION - Techniques and mechanisms for providing access to a function with an input/output (I/O) device. In an embodiment, a main memory of a computer system including the I/O device stores a function-context data structure associating a function with a context for an access to the function. The I/O device stores a configuration for the I/O device to provide the function. In another embodiment, the software process exchanges information with the function-context data structure for the access to the function. The I/O device performs a synchronization of the function-context data structure and the configuration data structure with respect to one another, wherein the function-context data structure operates as a register level interface which interfaces the I/O device and the software process with one another. | 09-18-2014 |
| 20140310543 | METHOD AND APPARATUS TO REDUCE IDLE LINK POWER IN A PLATFORM - A method and apparatus to reduce the idle link power in a platform. In one embodiment of the invention, the host and its coupled endpoint(s) in the platform each has a low power idle link state that allows disabling of the high speed link circuitry in both the host and its coupled endpoint(s). This allows the platform to reduce its idle power as both the host and its coupled endpoint(s) are able to turn off their high speed link circuitry in one embodiment of the invention. | 10-16-2014 |
| 20140344500 | PCI EXPRESS TUNNELING OVER A MULTI-PROTOCOL I/O INTERCONNECT - Described are embodiments of methods, apparatuses, and systems for PCIe tunneling across a multi-protocol I/O interconnect of a computer apparatus. A method for PCIe tunneling across the multi-protocol I/O interconnect may include establishing a first communication path between ports of a switching fabric of a multi-protocol I/O interconnect of a computer apparatus in response to a peripheral component interconnect express (PCIe) device being connected to the computer apparatus, and establishing a second communication path between the switching fabric and a PCIe controller. The method may further include routing, by the multi-protocol I/O interconnect, PCIe protocol packets of the PCIe device from the PCIe device to the PCIe controller over the first and second communication paths. Other embodiments may be described and claimed. | 11-20-2014 |
| 20150089107 | Providing A Serial Protocol For A Bidirectional Serial Interconnect - In one embodiment, the present invention includes a host controller with transmit logic to prepare data into a packet for communication along an interconnect and to transmit the packet. This packet may include a preamble portion having a first predetermined value, a content portion including the data and having a plurality of symbols each including a start bit separate from the data, an error detection portion including an inverted version of the content portion, and a postamble portion having a second predetermined value. Other embodiments are described and claimed. | 03-26-2015 |
| 20150089110 | Providing A Consolidated Sideband Communication Channel Between Devices - In an embodiment, the present invention includes a protocol stack having a transaction layer and a link layer. In addition a first physical (PHY) unit is coupled to the protocol stack to provide communication between a processor and a device coupled to the processor via a physical link, where the first PHY unit is of a low power communication protocol and includes a first physical unit circuit. In turn, a second PHY unit is coupled to the protocol stack to provide communication between the processor and the device via a sideband channel coupled between the multicore processor and the device separate from the physical link, where the second PHY unit includes a second physical unit circuit. Other embodiments are described and claimed. | 03-26-2015 |
