초록 ▼

A method and apparatus are provided for receiving a packet stream having fixed length packets. Data carried in the packet stream is selectively processed for output to a computer. A packet identifier filter selects particular packets from the recovered packet stream. A computer disk controller recei

A method and apparatus are provided for receiving a packet stream having fixed length packets. Data carried in the packet stream is selectively processed for output to a computer. A packet identifier filter selects particular packets from the recovered packet stream. A computer disk controller receives the packets selected by the filter and manages the transfer of packet data from the packets to and from a buffer. A data bus is coupled to the disk controller for communicating the packet data from the buffer to the computer. A data compression stage prior to the disk controller compresses packets from the recovered packet stream in order to provide a gap between data carried by successive packets to be provided by the disk controller. In this manner, a low cost disk controller chip can be used to control the buffering of data in a cable or satellite television modem that provides, e.g., Internet access.

대표청구항 ▼

[ We claim:] [1.] A method for processing consecutive fixed length packets of a packet stream to simulate a computer disk drive output format which requires a temporal gap between successive ones of said packets, including a first packet and an adjacent packet, comprising the steps of:locating a pac

[ We claim:] [1.] A method for processing consecutive fixed length packets of a packet stream to simulate a computer disk drive output format which requires a temporal gap between successive ones of said packets, including a first packet and an adjacent packet, comprising the steps of:locating a packet header for said first packet; andperforming at least one of a deleting and coding step to reduce an amount of data in said first packet corresponding to said temporal gas, where said deleting step comprises deleting at least one known or calculable fixed length field from said header and said coding step comprises coding an N-bit packet identifier from said header into an M-bit reference value, where M