Hot insertable active SCSI terminator
US5546017A · kind A · utility
Assignee
Inventor
Key dates
| Filing date | Mar 23, 1995 |
| Grant date | Aug 13, 1996 |
| Priority date | — |
| Expiry date | Mar 23, 2015 |
Classification
- Technology area (CPC H)Electricity
- CPC primaryH04L25/0298
- WIPO fieldComputer technology
- WIPO sectorElectrical engineering
Abstract
The invention is an active, hot insertable, SCSI terminator circuit having a bypass device that permits an initially unpowered active SCSI terminator to be coupled to a signal line of a powered SCSI bus such that no damage results to the SCSI terminator circuit itself or to other SCSI devices on the SCSI bus, and without having the effect of altering the existing state of the SCSI bus as a result of the coupling. Preferably, the terminating element of the SCSI terminator is a p-channel MOSFET. The SCSI terminator is prevented from being damaged during the coupling by using the bypass device to effectively short the gate of the p-channel MOSFET terminating element to its drain. When the drain of the p-channel MOSFET terminating element is shorted to its gate the amount of current the SCSI terminator may draw from any and all SCSI signal lines during the coupling is substantially limited to less than 50 .mu.A. The bypass device performs the shorting function until a SCSI terminator reference voltage powers up to its steady state value, after which the bypass device is disabled.
Source: USPTO / EPO open patent data. Objective bibliographic and citation counts.