Datasheet

553
6120F–ATARM–03-Oct-06
AT91SAM7X512/256/128 Preliminary
37.3.2 Transmit Block
This block transmits frames in accordance with the Ethernet IEEE 802.3 CSMA/CD protocol.
Frame assembly starts by adding preamble and the start frame delimiter. Data is taken from the
transmit FIFO a word at a time. Data is transmitted least significant nibble first. If necessary,
padding is added to increase the frame length to 60 bytes. CRC is calculated as a 32-bit polyno-
mial. This is inverted and appended to the end of the frame, taking the frame length to a
minimum of 64 bytes. If the No CRC bit is set in the second word of the last buffer descriptor of a
transmit frame, neither pad nor CRC are appended.
In full-duplex mode, frames are transmitted immediately. Back-to-back frames are transmitted at
least 96 bit times apart to guarantee the interframe gap.
In half-duplex mode, the transmitter checks carrier sense. If asserted, it waits for it to de-assert
and then starts transmission after the interframe gap of 96 bit times. If the collision signal is
asserted during transmission, the transmitter transmits a jam sequence of 32 bits taken from the
data register and then retry transmission after the back off time has elapsed.
The back-off time is based on an XOR of the 10 least significant bits of the data coming from the
transmit FIFO and a 10-bit pseudo random number generator. The number of bits used depends
on the number of collisions seen. After the first collision, 1 bit is used, after the second 2, and so
on up to 10. Above 10, all 10 bits are used. An error is indicated and no further attempts are
made if 16 attempts cause collisions.
If transmit DMA underruns, bad CRC is automatically appended using the same mechanism as
jam insertion and the tx_er signal is asserted. For a properly configured system, this should
never happen.
If the back pressure bit is set in the network control register in half duplex mode, the transmit
block transmits 64 bits of data, which can consist of 16 nibbles of 1011 or in bit-rate mode 64 1s,
whenever it sees an incoming frame to force a collision. This provides a way of implementing
flow control in half-duplex mode.
37.3.3 Pause Frame Support
The start of an 802.3 pause frame is as follows:
The network configuration register contains a receive pause enable bit (13). If a valid pause
frame is received, the pause time register is updated with the frame’s pause time, regardless of
its current contents and regardless of the state of the configuration register bit 13. An interrupt
(12) is triggered when a pause frame is received, assuming it is enabled in the interrupt mask
register. If bit 13 is set in the network configuration register and the value of the pause time reg-
ister is non-zero, no new frame is transmitted until the pause time register has decremented to
zero.
The loading of a new pause time, and hence the pausing of transmission, only occurs when the
EMAC is configured for full-duplex operation. If the EMAC is configured for half-duplex, there is
no transmission pause, but the pause frame received interrupt is still triggered.
Table 37-3. Start of an 802.3 Pause Frame
Destination
Address
Source
Address
Type
(Mac Control Frame)
Pause
Opcode Pause Time
0x0180C2000001 6 bytes 0x8808 0x0001 2 bytes