Patent · US Expired

Centralized backplane bus arbiter for multiprocessor systems

US5280591A · kind A · utility

41Cited by
18References
20Claims
0Family size

Assignee

Inventors

Key dates

Filing dateJul 22, 1991
Grant dateJan 18, 1994
Priority date
Expiry dateJul 22, 2011

Classification

  • Technology area (CPC G)Physics
  • CPC primaryG06F13/364
  • WIPO fieldComputer technology
  • WIPO sectorElectrical engineering

Abstract

An Arbiter (36) is coupled to a multiprocessor system (10) Global Bus (24) having two separate main buses: an address bus (ABUS) and a data bus (DBUS). Bus agents coupled to the Global Bus request access to use the buses by asserting bus request lines to the Arbiter. The Arbiter is a dual level, round robin Arbiter that employs a fast, single-cycle arbitration technique. During each system clock cycle, the Arbiter considers the signals on the request input lines and generates corresponding grant output lines which dictate, for the next cycle, which bus agent is to receive access to the address bus and which bus agent is to receive access to the data bus.

Source: USPTO / EPO open patent data. Objective bibliographic and citation counts.