iPOINT Switch Management Hardware

The iPOINT switch management hardware provides a terminal-based interface to the iPOINT switch. The circuit resides as a sub-system on the switch FPGA (XC4013). The mangement hardware interfaces between the cell counters and control signals of the chip and an external VT100 terminal. The circuit was constructed using VHDL and synthesized using Mentor Graphic's Autologic.

Block Diagram and Functionality

The management circuit provides cell counts and sets user-selected control modes

Cell Counts

Number of cells transmitted on each port. 16-bit counters. Displayed in hex.

Control Modes

The control modes are used for debugging. The functions are:

Cross Mode: Send cells from port to trunk and from trunk to port
Block Mode: All cells held at input queue (no switching)
Blast Port: Test cell from ROM sent to ports
Blast Trunk: Tell cell from ROM sent to trunk port
Run: Update VT100 screen continuously

VHDL Synthesis for FPGA Logic

Enhanced Table-based Design

This page is under construction