Picker International, Inc.

Pradipa Subramaniam

Robert A Cecil

John F Vesel

Fred C Mailey

A network (A) carries large image blocks among medical diagnostic equipment (20, 22, 24), archive computer (26), and data handling and display stations (28, 30). Four kilobyte packets of 4 megabyte image blocks are moved from transmit buffers (38) to queuing buffers (42). The order in which packets from the queuing buffers are transmitted on the network medium (10) is determined by a combination of an assigned priority, duration in the buffer, and a statistical availability of the addressed receiving node. A data link (52) at the receiving node includes an elasticity buffer (122) which stores a small plurality bits, e.g. 5, to accommodate for variances in the clock speed of the transmitting and receiving nodes. A buffer table (60) monitors memory addresses at which preceding data packets corresponding to the same image are stored and provides address information to send each subsequently received packet. Before transmitting the image data packet, the transmitting node data link first sends a query to the receiving node to check availability to avoid the transmission of relatively large data packets to unavailable nodes. Each transmitting node normally passes the token after it has transmitted one packet of data. When the transmitting node holds the token for several sequential data packet transmissions, it passes a restricted token which allows the other nodes to transmit high priority small messages that are much smaller than the image data packets.

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Richmond Hts., OH, United States of America

Pradipa Subramaniam