Lane division multiplexing of an I/O link

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-10025748-B2
Application number	US-201314040421-A
Country	US
Kind code	B2
Filing date	Sep 27, 2013
Priority date	Sep 27, 2013
Publication date	Jul 17, 2018
Grant date	Jul 17, 2018

Abstract

A system can include a host device and a remote terminal. The host device can include a host terminal, the host terminal including a host configuration manager to allocate a data lane to an I/O protocol and a protocol multiplexer to carry out allocation of the data lane based on the allocation of the configuration manager. The remote terminal can include a remote configuration manager. The remote configuration manager is to communicate with the remote configuration manager via a control bus to detect connection of an I/O device to an I/O port and to allocate the data lane to the I/O protocol.

First claim

What is claimed is:

1. A system, comprising:
a remote terminal comprising:
a first port associated with a first Input/Output (I/O) protocol;
a second port associated with a second I/O protocol; and
a remote configuration manager configured to detect device connection at the first port and the second port;

a host terminal comprising:
a plurality of data lanes coupling the host terminal to the remote terminal;
a first I/O interface configured to operate at the first I/O protocol;
a second I/O interface configured to operate at the second I/O protocol;
a host configuration manager to allocate the plurality of data lanes to one or more I/O protocols based on the device connections detected at the first port and the second port; and
a protocol multiplexer to carry out allocation of the plurality of data lanes based on the allocation of the host configuration manager, wherein the protocol multiplexer couples a first data lane of the plurality of data lanes to the first I/O interface if device connection is detected at the first port and the protocol multiplexer couples a second data lane of the plurality of data lanes to the second I/O interface if device connection is detected at the second port; and

the host configuration manager to communicate with the remote configuration manager via a control bus to receive device connection information from the remote terminal.

2. The system of claim 1 , wherein the control bus comprises a uni-directional communication link or a bi-directional communication link and wherein the plurality of data lanes comprise uni-directional data lanes.

3. The system of claim 1 , wherein multiple I/O devices are coupled to the I/O ports of the remote terminal and wherein the plurality of data lanes are allocated to corresponding I/O protocols of the respective I/O devices.

4. The system of claim 1 , wherein the plurality of data lanes are unidirectional and are allocated symmetrically.

5. The system of claim 1 , wherein the host configuration manager is to allocate data lanes based on I/O device capability information, the information to be communicated to the host configuration manager by the remote configuration manager.

6. The system of claim 1 , wherein the remote terminal and the host terminal are included in a same device.

7. A host terminal of a host electronic device, comprising:
a plurality of data lanes coupling the host terminal to a remote terminal, wherein the remote terminal comprises:
a first port associated with a first Input/Output (I/O) protocol;
a second port associated with a second I/O protocol; and
a remote configuration manager configured to detect device connection at the first port and the second port;

a first I/O interface configured to operate at the first I/O protocol;
a second I/O interface configured to operate at the second I/O protocol;
a host configuration manager to allocate the plurality of data lanes to one or more I/O protocols based on the device connections detected at the first port and the second port; and
a protocol multiplexer to carry out allocation of the plurality of data lanes as determined by the host configuration manager, wherein the protocol multiplexer couples a first data lane of the plurality of data lanes to the first I/O interface if device connection is detected at the first port and the protocol multiplexer couples a second data lane of the plurality of data lanes to the second I/O interface if device connection is detected at the second port.

8. The host terminal of claim 7 , wherein the plurality of data lanes are allocated symmetrically or asymmetrically.

9. The host terminal of claim 8 , wherein the plurality of data lanes comprise uni-directional data lanes.

10. The host terminal of claim 7 , wherein the host configuration manager is to communicate with the remote configuration manager of the remote terminal via a control bus to allocate the plurality of data lanes.

11. The host terminal of claim 10 , wherein the control bus comprises a bi-directional link.

12. The host terminal claim 10 , wherein the host electronic device comprises the remote terminal.

13. The host terminal of claim 7 , wherein the host configuration manager is to allocate data lanes based on I/O device capability information, the information to be communicated to the host configuration manager by the remote configuration manager of the remote terminal.

14. A computing system, comprising:
logic, in a host terminal of a host device, to detect connection of an first I/O device at a first port of a remote terminal and detect connection of an second I/O device at a second port of the remote terminal, wherein the first port is associated with a first I/O protocol and the second port is associated with a second I/O protocol;
logic to communicate with the remote terminal to allocate a plurality of data lanes to one or more I/O protocols depending on the detected connections, wherein a first data lane of the plurality of data lanes is coupled to a first I/O interface configured to use the first I/O protocol if the first I/O device is detected at the first port and a second data lane of the plurality of data lanes is coupled to a second I/O interface configured to use the second I/O protocol if the second I/O device is detected at the second port; and
logic to transfer data from the first I/O device to the host device via the first data lane and transfer data from the second I/O device to the host device via the second data lane.

15. The computing system of claim 14 , further comprising:
logic to detect, in the remote terminal, connection of the first I/O device to the first port of the remote terminal; and
logic to inform the host terminal of the connection of the first I/O device.

16. The computing system of claim 14 , wherein a remote configuration manager of the remote terminal communicates with a host configuration manager of the host terminal via a bi-directional link.

17. The computing system of claim 14 , wherein the plurality of data lanes comprise unidirectional data lanes.

18. The computing system of claim 14 , further comprising:
logic to detect disconnection of the first I/O device from the first port; and
logic to return the first data lane to an unallocated state to be allocated to a new I/O protocol.

Assignees

• Intel Corp

Inventors

• Chen Huimin
• Bell Dennis M
• Dunstan Robert A
• Quiet Duane G
• Solomon Gary A

Classifications

• G06F13/4282 Primary

  on a serial bus, e.g. I2C bus, SPI bus (on daisy chain buses G06F13/4247) · CPC title

• G06F13/4265

  on a point to point bus (G06F13/4247, G06F13/4282 take precedence) · CPC title

• G06F13/4221 Primary

  being an input/output bus, e.g. ISA bus, EISA bus, PCI bus, SCSI bus · CPC title

• Y02D10/14

  Cross-Sectional Technologies · mapped topic

• Y02D10/151

  Cross-Sectional Technologies · mapped topic