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.
Patent No.:
Date of Patent:
Feb. 04, 2014
Filed:
Jun. 29, 2012
Annie Foong, Aloha, OR (US);
Pak-lung Seto, Shrewsbury, MA (US);
Annie Foong, Aloha, OR (US);
Pak-Lung Seto, Shrewsbury, MA (US);
Intel Corporation, Santa Clara, CA (US);
Abstract
Techniques herein include systems and methods for driver-assisted BAR mapping that virtualize PCI functions, but without virtualizing the storage media itself. Such techniques make use of unused BARs (Base Address Registers) of a master (Operating system-facing) device to gain access to other PCIe logical instances, while still exposing only a single PCIe function (connection or channel) to system software. This technique provides a new concept of logical PCIe device instances through BAR mapping by making use of unused BARs to extend access to any number of PCIe instances or memory-mapped I/O devices behind a master device such that only a single PCIe function is exposed to system software. Embodiments can thus extend access to one or more additional storage devices through one level of BAR indirection. As a result, such techniques and embodiments enable the multiplication of storage capacity and performance through the aggregation of multiple, similar hardware components.