| abstract |
(57) [Summary] (Modifications) [PROBLEMS] To provide a method, a system, and an apparatus for supplying data from a PCI-PCI bus bridge to an input / output adapter. In one embodiment, a PCI-PCI bus is provided. When the bridge receives a request for data from the I / O adapter, the PCI-PCI bus bridge determines whether the requested data is contained in the cache memory within the bridge and, if so, the I / O bus. Supply to adapter. If not, the bridge first caches the data from system memory. To ensure that the data in the cache memory is not stale, a signal indicating whether the data contained in the buffer is stale is periodically or aperiodically transmitted from the PCI host bridge to the PCI-PC Supplied to the I-bridge. If the data is stale, in some embodiments, the contents of all buffers are cleared; in other embodiments, only the contents of the buffer containing the stale data are cleared. |