System clock distribution in a distributed computing environment
AssigneeAdvanced Processor Architectures, LLC
InventorsLouis Edumund Chall, John Bradley Serson, Philip Arnold Roberts, Cecil Eugene Hutchins
Life of this patent
Estimating the term…
Abstract
A system clock signal distributed to electronic configurable and reconfigurable computing devices within a distributed computing system. The distributed computing devices, which may be dual-die chip carriers (DDCC), include input addressable data/clock ports on which system clock signals are accepted and may be propagated on one or more data/clock output ports. The input and/or output ports of various distributed computing devices may be configured and reconfigured according to system preferences or requirements.
Claims23
A distributed computing system comprising:
- a clock generator configured to generate a first clock signal of a first frequency;
- and
- a first computing node comprising:
- at least two integrated circuit die;
- a plurality of clock input ports configurable to receive a clock input signal, wherein a clock input port is dynamically selected during operation to receive the first clock signal based at least in part on a system clock distribution scheme;
- an external communications interface configured to:
- communicate with a second computing node by clocking data into or out of the first computing node using the first clock signal when communicating with the second computing node, wherein the second computing node comprises at least two integrated circuit die;
- and
- communicate with an external computing device operating using a second clock signal at a second frequency that is different from the first frequency, wherein, when communicating with the external computing device, the external communications interface is further configured to:
- determine the second frequency of the second clock signal;
- generate a substitute clock signal operating at the second frequency;
- and
- communicate with the external computing device using the substitute clock signal in place of the first clock signal.
A method of device communication, the method comprising:
- receiving a first clock signal of a distributed computing system at a clock input port of a computing node of the distributed computing system, wherein the clock input port is dynamically selected during operation of the distributed computing system based at least in part on a system clock distribution scheme, and wherein the computing node is one of a plurality of computing nodes of the distributed computing system;
- detecting, by the computing node of the distributed computing system, a communication from an external computing device, wherein the first clock signal of the distributed computing system is configured to operate at a first frequency when not in communication with the external computing device;
- determining based at least in part on the communication that a first clock signal of the external computing device operates at a second frequency that differs from the first frequency;
- generating a second clock signal at the distributed computing system, the second clock signal operating at the second frequency;
- and
- communicating with the external computing device using the second clock signal.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.