System and method to test internal PCI agents
AssigneeVLSI Technology, Inc.
InventorPeter Chambers
Life of this patent
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Abstract
The present invention is an on board internal peripheral component interconnect (PCI) bus tester for testing internal components of a microelectronic chip. The present invention includes internal PCI testing agents that facilitate the application of test vectors to internal PCI agents from a minimal number of external periphery pins on the chip. The on board internal peripheral component interconnect (PCI) bus tester then captures the state of an internal PCI bus and transmits it though the external periphery pins of the chip for analysis to determine if the internal agent components are functioning correctly.
Claims12
An on board internal peripheral component interconnect (PCI) bus tester, comprising:
- an external serial scan interface adapted to communicate testing information between external devices and said on board internal PCI bus tester and internal PCI devices;
- an internal PCI bus tester control component is coupled to said external serial scan interface, said internal PCI bus tester control component adapted to control and direct a flow of testing information to and from internal PCI agents, said control unit is further adapted to receive serial packets of test information from said external serial scan interface and transmit serial packets of test information back to said external serial scan interface;
- a serial-scan direct-access PCI agent coupled to said internal PCI bus tester control component, said serial-scan direct-access PCI agent is also coupled to the internal PCI bus and is adapted to process raw test vectors comprised of binary “1” and “0” units that define the state of the internal PCI buslines;
- a serial-scan initiator agent coupled to said internal bus tester control component, said serial-scan initiator agent is also coupled to the internal PCI bus and is adapted to execute refined test vectors comprising high level bus transactions and capture the state of the internal PCI bus lines;
- and
- a PCI serial scan target agent coupled to said internal PCI bus tester control component;
- said PCI serial scan target agent is also coupled to the internal PCI bus and is adapted to respond to PCI bus transactions and capture the state of the internal PCI bus lines.
An internal bus tester, comprising:
- an external interface adapted to communicate information between external devices and said internal bus tester and internal devices;
- a bus tester control component adapted to control and direct a flow of testing information to and from internal devices, said control unit is further adapted to receive information from said external interface and transmit information back to said external interface;
- an internal testing agent coupled to said bus tester control component, said internal testing agent is adapted to insert testing information and capture testing information on the internal PCI bus, said internal testing agent includes a master testing agent coupled to said internal bus and said bus tester control component, a master testing agent adapted to generate bus transactions and thereby obtain control of said internal bus for the purpose of communicating test vector information with a target agent coupled to said internal bus.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.