System architecture

Abstract

A system for a high capacity computer-based communications device is described. The system has an enhance backplane supporting a plurality of busses working independently of each other and each utilized for a different data type. The backplane supports a cPCI bus, a H.110 bus, and a StarLan bus. The system provides for increasing the capacity of the cPCI bus through bridging between two cPCI segments. A first serializer, operatively connected to the first cPCI segment, is used to receive data from a first PCI bus, serializes the data, and transfers the serial data stream to a second serializer which is operatively coupled to the second bus. The second serializer de-serializes the transferred data and transfers it to the second PCI bus. The backplane is utilized with a router and I/O modules to provide a device which combines traditional IP routing capabilities with a gateway for non-IP traffic to the IP network. A unique routing method is utilized to reduce the overhead associated with identifying data flows at the I/O module. The router receives the incoming datagrams and looks at the layer and above headers to determine which I/O module to send the data to and to identify the data flow. The router then encapsulates the data into a specialized frame which designates the I/O module and uniquely identifies the data flow and forwards this over the network bus to the appropriate module. The module then determines the destination of the data via the specialized frame without having to look at the layer and above headers.