Silicon Image Patent Grants

Method and system for communicating control information via out-of-band symbols

Granted: September 26, 2006
Patent Number: 7113507
A serial communications architecture for communicating between hosts and data store devices. The Storage Link architecture is specially adapted to support communications between multiple hosts and storage devices via a switching network, such as a storage area network. The Storage Link architecture specifies various communications techniques that can be combined to reduce the overall cost and increase the overall performance of communications. The Storage Link architecture may provide…

Supporting circuitry and method for controlling pixels

Granted: September 19, 2006
Patent Number: 7109958
In a pixel display there is disclosed a pixel arrangement for LCD displays having 5 subpixel components. Namely, red, blue, green with adjacent red green pixels bordered by blue subpixels. Circuitry is disclosed for such pixels in which capacitors, functioning in sample hold circuits receive pulses to their terminal immediately after transistors are open with the resulting voltage change there occurring as an unintended voltage signal being applied to an LCD cell thereby causing…

Phase lock loop with coarse control loop having frequency lock detector and device including same

Granted: September 5, 2006
Patent Number: 7102446
A phase lock loop (PLL) for controlling a sampling clock or other clock, and a data sampling circuit, transceiver, or other device including such a PLL. The PLL includes a multi-range VCO, at least one fine control loop for controlling the VCO, and a coarse control loop for controlling the VCO by changing its frequency-voltage characteristic. The coarse control loop includes a frequency lock detector and voltage range monitoring logic. Typically, the frequency lock detector locks…

Bidirectional bridge circuit having high common mode rejection and high input sensitivity

Granted: September 5, 2006
Patent Number: 7103013
A bidirectional communications interface is provided that connects a transmitter and a receiver, or a transceiver, to a transmission line. Under an embodiment, the bidirectional interface generates positive and negative polarity data signals using two separate differential amplifiers that receive differential signal pairs from each side of a differential link to the transmission line and the transmitter. The bidirectional interface controls common mode rejection in each of the separate…

Method and apparatus for regenerating a clock for auxiliary data transmitted over a serial link with video data

Granted: August 8, 2006
Patent Number: 7088398
A communication system including a transmitter, a receiver, and a serial link, in which encoded data (e.g., video, audio, and optionally also other auxiliary data) are transmitted from the transmitter to the receiver. The serial link can but need not be a TMDS or TMDS-like link. In typical embodiments, packets of encoded audio data are transmitted over each of one or more channels of the link during data islands between bursts of encoded video data, a pixel clock is transmitted over the…

Method and apparatus for adaptive control of PLL loop bandwidth

Granted: June 13, 2006
Patent Number: 7062004
A scheme for reducing jitter in high-speed digital communication by adaptively controlling the loop bandwidth of a receiver PLL to reduce the relative jitter between the recovered data and clock. The scheme uses phase pointer activity to represent the relative jitter. The phase pointer activity is measured and used to control the receiver PLL loop bandwidth. The receiver PLL loop bandwidth is repeatedly incremented or decremented by a step size based on the comparison between a newly…

Logic gates including diode-connected metal-oxide-semiconductor field-effect transistors (MOSFETS) to control input threshold voltage levels and switching transients of output logic signals

Granted: June 6, 2006
Patent Number: 7058121
Logic gates are provided that include a diode-connected metal-oxide-semiconductor field-effect transistor (MOSFET) to produce a gate threshold voltage that differs from a mid-supply voltage level, while providing symmetry in the switching transients of the output logic signals. In one embodiment, the logic gate is a NAND gate. Use of a diode-connected n-type MOSFET in a ground path produces a threshold voltage level higher than the mid-supply voltage level. Use of a diode-connected…

Method and system for transition-controlled selective block inversion communications

Granted: May 2, 2006
Patent Number: 7039121
A serial communications architecture for communicating between hosts and data store devices. The Storage Link architecture is specially adapted to support communications between multiple hosts and storage devices via a switching network, such as a storage area network. The Storage Link architecture specifies various communications techniques that can be combined to reduce the overall cost and increase the overall performance of communications. The Storage Link architecture may provide…

Method and system for temporary interruption of video data transmission

Granted: April 25, 2006
Patent Number: 7035290
A communication system including a transmitter, a receiver, and a serial link, that is capable of transmitting packets of data (e.g., frames of video data) over the link. The transmitter and receiver are operable in any selected one of a transmission mode (in which the data are transmitted over the link from the transmitter to the receiver) and a mute mode in which transmission of data over the link has been interrupted. Typically in the transmission mode, encrypted video data are…

Method and circuit for DC measurement of phase uniformity of multi-phase clocks

Granted: April 18, 2006
Patent Number: 7031858
Methods and circuits for measuring clock phase uniformity of multi-phase clock set, including by generating at least one DC phase difference signal such that the DC phase difference signal is, or the DC phase difference signals are, indicative of the phase difference between the clocks of each of multiple pairs of clocks of the clock set, and methods and circuitry for generating such DC phase difference signals. Preferably, multiplexer circuitry asserts to DC signal generation circuitry…

Method and apparatus for deinterlacing digital video images

Granted: April 11, 2006
Patent Number: 7027099
A digital image processor is provided. The digital image processor includes a deinterlacing processor that is implemented upon a digital processing unit. The deinterlacing processor is coupled to an input operable to receive an interlaced video stream, a digital memory for storing portions of the interlaced video signal, and an output operable to transmit a deinterlaced video stream. The deinterlacing processor is operable to perform frequency analysis upon the received interlaced video…

Deinterlacing of video sources via image feature edge detection

Granted: April 4, 2006
Patent Number: 7023487
An interlaced to progressive scan video converter which identifies object edges and directions, and calculates new pixel values based on the edge information. Source image data from a single video field is analyzed to detect object edges and the orientation of those edges. A 2-dimensional array of image elements surrounding each pixel location in the field is high-pass filtered along a number of different rotational vectors, and a null or minimum in the set of filtered data indicates a…

Voltage swing detection circuit for hot plug event or device detection via a differential link

Granted: March 7, 2006
Patent Number: 7009827
In some embodiments, a device detection circuit for detecting whether a device is coupled to a differential link, a transmitter (e.g., a transceiver) including such a circuit, and a system including such a transmitter. Preferably, the device detection circuit includes two branches (each branch including a switch), a current source that causes current to flow through either branch, or to be shared by both branches, depending on the state of each switch, and a voltage swing detector…

Differential amplifiers using asymmetric transfer characteristics to suppress input noise in output logic signals

Granted: January 10, 2006
Patent Number: 6985005
An output amplifier is provided for use in a bidirectional communications interface, for example, connecting a transmitter and a receiver to a transmission line. The output amplifier includes a differential amplifier pair connected to output circuitry. The differential amplifier pair receives differential data signal pairs from each of a transmission line and a transmitter. The output circuitry receives signals from the differential amplifier pair and, in response, forms single-ended…

Method and system for host handling of communications errors

Granted: December 13, 2005
Patent Number: 6976201
A serial communications architecture for communicating between hosts and data store devices. The Storage Link architecture is specially adapted to support communications between multiple hosts and storage devices via a switching network, such as a storage area network. The Storage Link architecture specifies various communications techniques that can be combined to reduce the overall cost and increase the overall performance of communications. The Storage Link architecture can provide…

Digital display jitter correction apparatus and method

Granted: November 1, 2005
Patent Number: 6961095
A jitter correction apparatus and method are disclosed. In one embodiment, the apparatus has a rising edge corrector to receive a jittered signal and to output a jitter corrected rising edge of the jittered signal. The apparatus may also have a falling edge corrector to receive the jittered signal and to output a jitter corrected falling edge of the jittered signal. The jitter correction apparatus may include an output device to receive the jitter corrected rising edge, to receive the…

Methods and systems for sending side-channel data during data inactive period

Granted: October 11, 2005
Patent Number: 6954491
The present invention relates to a serial interface transmission system with more than one data line, in which the transmitted data has in-band and out-of-band characters. More particularly, the present invention relates to methods and systems for sending side channel data over a high-speed digital communications link, e.g., a video link. One embodiment of the invention provides a high-speed digital transmitter capable of sending side channel data. The transmitter includes a channel zero…

System and method for measuring pseudo pixel error rate

Granted: September 13, 2005
Patent Number: 6944804
A system and method for measuring and utilizing a pseudo pixel error rate in digital data transmission is disclosed. As an alternative to measuring actual pixel error rate measurement, the present invention uses a pseudo pixel error rate detection scheme where the errors occurred in the special character patterns used in data encoding are measured. A particular embodiment uses a de-glitch filter for filtering the glitches from an unfiltered data enable (DE), a delay for delaying the…

High-speed and high-precision phase locked loop

Granted: August 16, 2005
Patent Number: 6930560
A phase lock loop includes a charge pump, a voltage controlled oscillator (VCO), and a phase frequency detector. The phase frequency detector has a dynamic logic structure. The phase frequency detector generates up and down signals for directing the charge pump to provide a voltage signal to the VCO to vary the frequency of the VCO clock. The difference between the up and down signals is indicative of the phase difference between the reference clock signal and the VCO clock. The phase…

Method and system for video and auxiliary data transmission over a serial link

Granted: July 5, 2005
Patent Number: 6914637
A communication system including a transmitter, a receiver, and a serial link, in which encoded data (e.g., video, audio, and optionally also other auxiliary data) are transmitted from the transmitter to the receiver. The serial link can but need not be a TMDS or TMDS-like link. In typical embodiments, packets of encoded audio data are transmitted over each of one or more channels of the link during data islands between bursts of encoded video data. Other aspects of the invention are…