The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document.

The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge covers the following: Patent number, Date patent was issued, Date patent was filed, Title of the patent, Applicant, Inventor, Assignee, Attorney firm, Primary examiner, Assistant examiner, CPCs, and Abstract. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document (in Adobe Acrobat format, aka pdf). To download or print any patent click here.

Date of Patent:
Nov. 02, 1999

Filed:

May. 16, 1997
Applicant:
Inventor:

Yueh-Yao Nain, Hsin-Chu, TW;

Assignee:
Attorney:
Primary Examiner:
Assistant Examiner:
Int. Cl.
CPC ...
G06F / ;
U.S. Cl.
CPC ...
710 22 ; 710 24 ; 710 28 ; 710 44 ;
Abstract

Higher speed data transactions between a host computer's system memory and a plurality of slow peripheral devices are accomplished by providing distributed DMA functions along with distributed pre-fetch buffers. The first I/O device accesses the host bus via a first DMA channel and a first pre-fetch buffer, the second I/O device accesses the host bus via a second DMA channel and a second pre-fetch buffer, and the third I/O device accesses the host bus via a third DMA channel and a third pre-fetch buffer. In a first DMA transaction, the first pre-fetch buffer is filled with data being transferred between the first I/O device and the host system memory. While the data are transferred between the pre-fetch buffer and either the first I/O device or the system memory, the second pre-fetch buffer is being filled pursuant to a second DMA transaction between the second I/O device and the system memory. This strategy increases the speed of successive DMA transactions between a plurality of I/O devices and the host computer system's memory.


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