Apparatus for use in a computer systems
Apparatus for use in a computer system comprises a bus architecture, a plurality of modules connected to the bus architecture, at least one module being latency tolerant and at least one module being latency intolerant. The bus architecture comprises a primary bus ( 3 ) having latency intolerant modules connected thereto, a secondary bus ( 4 ) having latency tolerant modules connected thereto, and a primary to secondary bus interface module ( 5 ) interconnecting the primary and secondary buses.
1 . Apparatus for a computer system comprising:
a bus architecture;
a plurality of modules connected to the bus architecture;
means for receiving data requests from modules for respective required data packets, each request including address data indicating the location of the data packet concerned, and sequence data indicating the timing of the request relative to other data requests issued by the module concerned;
means for receiving returned data packets and associated sequence data;
a storage area associated with each requesting module for storing the returned data packets in respective storage locations therein, in an order indicated by the associated sequence data; and
transfer means for transferring data packets from the storage area to the requesting module in the order of the storage locations in the storage area.
2 . Apparatus as claimed in claim 1 , wherein the transfer means is operable to cycle through the storage locations of the storage area.
3 . Apparatus as claimed in claim 1 , wherein the storage area associated with each requesting module is provided by a dual port RAM device.
4 . A computer system comprising at least one external storage device and apparatus as claimed in claim
5 . A computer system comprising apparatus as claimed in claim 1 .
6 . An integrated circuit comprising apparatus as claimed in claim 1 .
7 . A graphics processing system comprising apparatus as claimed in claim 1 .
8 . A games console comprising apparatus as claimed in claim 1.