PCI-X, PCI Pod for Bus Doctor Analyzer

The The PCI-X analyzer pods turn the Bus Doctor into a full-featured protocol analyzer, with the depth, ease-of-use, protocol decoding and statistics needed by software and systems testers. It also provides the features needed by hardware engineers including multi-level triggering, filtering, state configuration and timing analysis of PCI transfers.

PCI Displays
At the Command level, the PCI-X analyzer provides a big-picture view for testers who are troubleshooting system-level or application-level issues. The State display provides byte-level access details for users who need to monitor PCI software, device drivers or firmware. For hardware engineers, the Timing Waveform display provides for analysis of PCI signal activity.

The analyzer allows for examining captured data at the Command, State, and Signal levels. The different display formats can be individually displayed or simultaneously displayed. When displayed simultaneously, each display can be automatically synchronized with the others, or used independently. A histogram provides a graphical summary of trace activity for the entire trace and makes it easy to point and click to any position within the trace.



PCI Capturing
The PCI analyzer provides multiple predefined capture configurations:

1. Timing Mode (Store all transitions)
2. State Mode (Store on clk edge)

* All states
* Addresses & data only
* Address only
* Data only

Custom State Modes can also be created.

The BusDoctor's Capture Engine pushes protocol recording to new limits with the following features: - Transitional Timestamping - Bandwidth - 4.5 Gbytes/sec - Depth - Stores up to 4 Gbytes - Segmentable Trace Buffer





PCI Triggering
The PCI-X Analyzer provides high-level trigger configurations for most common trigger scenarios. The high-level triggers provide drop-down boxes that enable the user to select specific commands, addresses, etc from a list without memorizing codes or positions. Users can also create and save custom triggers.

Triggering is used to stop the trace when a specific event or sequence of events occur. The analyzer also provides for stopping when the buffer is full, or looping endlessly until the user manually stops the trace. High-Level triggering options are provided for each bus. The User can also create custom triggers using the powerful Trigger Sequencer.





PCI Analyzer Trace Filtering
The PCI-X Analyzer provides commonly used high-level filter configurations. Many of the high-level filters provide drop-down boxes for configuration options. Users can also create and save custom filters.

Pre-configured filters for each bus allow the user to conserve buffer space and reduce the stored data to those items that are of interest. Custom filters can also be created.

PCI Statistics
The Real-Time Monitor can be easily configured by the user for almost any type of Statistical or Bit Error Rate measurement desired.

Dedicated hardware is provided for counting events. Software processes this data providing simple, or ratios of events per time or other events such as Transfers per Second, Transfers per Command, or Data Transfers per Error. These ratios are shown as Current Values and Peak Values, providing a summary of the changes over time.



Protocols, Standards, & Speed

PCI & PCI-X Protocol & Standards:
* PCI & PCI-X
* 32-bit & 64-bit
* 5V & 3.3V I/O

Speeds:
* 33MHz - 66MHz

*At 100Mhz and beyond some marginal cards will have signal integrity issues.

The analyzer decodes many of the high-level protocols that are transmitted on each bus. The Command Listing is typically used for displaying high-level protocols which may be transferred across a bus, while the State Listing typically displays native, low-level protocols.



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