Buses and Bus Architecture
Introduction
• The difficulty in transferring information among the units of
a computer largely depends on the physical distance
separating them.
• Two types of communication based on distance:-
• Intra-system – communication within a system.
• Inter-system - communication between two or more systems.
• Intra-system communication is primarily implemented by
groups of wires called buses, which support parallel that is
word-by-word, data transmission.
Buses
• The various processor-level components, CPU, caches, main
memory and I/O devices within a computer system
communicate via buses.
• The term “bus” in this context covers not only the physical
links among the components, but also the mechanisms for
controlling the exchange of signals over the bus.
• A single bus, the system bus, handles all the intra-system
communication. All units share the system bus, therefore at
any time only two units can communicate with each other.
Bus Transactions
• A typical system bus transaction is a memory load (read)
operation that involves the transfer of one or more data
words over the system bus from the memory to the CPU.
• Memory store (write) operation that involves the transfer
of one or more data words over the system bus from the CPU
to the memory.
• I/O operations – data transfer between an I/O and memory.
Bus Master and Bus Slaves
• In all operations Memory is a passive or slave device with
respect to system bus transactions, where as the CPU can
actively control the system bus; i.e., serve as bus master.
• I/O are normally slaves but can be made into master via
control units such as specialized I/O controllers or general
purpose I/O processors.
Fundamental Types of Buses
The system bus, or any other bus, consists of 3 main groups
of lines:
• The address lines, typically 8 to 32 in number, transmit the
address of data items stored in the system’s main memory or
I/O address space.
• The data lines, typically 16 to 128 in number, transmit data
words over the bus.
• The control lines, which perform such functions as
identifying the transaction type (memory read, memory
write, I/O operation, etc.) and synchronizing communication
between fast and slow units.
Fundamental Types of Buses
Need for I/O Bus
• The principle use of the system bus is high-speed data
transfer between the CPU and Main Memory (M).
• Most I/O devices are slower than the CPU or M and present
an external interface that is different from that of the system
bus. For example, magnetic disk units and other secondary
memories transfer data serially.
• Therefore, they need to be connected to the system bus via
interface circuits called I/O controllers that perform serial-to-
parallel and parallel-to-serial format conversions and other
control functions.
• A single I/O controller can interface many I/O devices to the
system bus.
Need for I/O Bus
Interconnected Structures
A system’s interconnection structure can be defined by a
graph whose nodes denotes components such as
computers, memories, communication controllers, etc., and
whose edges denote communication paths such as buses.
Dedicated Interconnection
• A path designed to link only two devices is said to be
dedicated.
• Dedicated pair of buses between all pair of components
that need to communicate.
• n units = (n*(n-1))/2 buses
Dedicated Interconnection
Advantages
• Allows very fast information transfer.
• All n devices can send or receive data simultaneously, and
there is no delay due to busy connections.
• Failure of one link affects only the two units connected to
the link, hence reliable. Can still communicate if data is sent
through other units.
Disadvantages
• High cost as number of buses needed is huge.
• Adding a unit is difficult as new unit must be connected to
every other unit.
Shared Interconnection
• A single shared bus can provide all communications among
n units.
• Such a path which is used to transfer information between
different sets of devices at different times is said to be (time)
shared or multiplexed.
• At any time only two units can communicate with each
other via the bus; the remaining units are effectively
disconnected from one another.
• A control method is required to supervise sharing of the bus
among the n devices.
• It is the most widely used connection method in computer
system.
Advantages
• Low cost.
• Flexible as new units can easily be introduced without
altering the system’s overall structure or the connections to
the old units.
Disadvantages
• Relatively slow, since units are forced to wait when the bus
is busy.
• Sensitive to failure of shared control circuits.
Intersystem Communication
Linear Ring
Star
Practice Questions
Q1. What do you mean by Bus and explain bus
interconnection? (AKTU 2014 - 2015)
Q2. What is the benefit of using a multiple-bus architecture
compared to single-bus architecture? (AKTU 2015 - 2016)
