Ethernet (ETH): media access control (MAC) with DMA controller
RM0090
1130/1731
DocID018909 Rev 11
The CRC generator calculates the 32-bit CRC for the FCS field of the Ethernet frame. The
encoding is defined by the following polynomial.
Transmit protocol
The MAC controls the operation of Ethernet frame transmission. It performs the following
functions to meet the IEEE 802.3/802.3z specifications. It:
•
generates the preamble and SFD
•
generates the jam pattern in Half-duplex mode
•
controls the Jabber timeout
•
controls the flow for Half-duplex mode (back pressure)
•
generates the transmit frame status
•
contains time stamp snapshot logic in accordance with IEEE 1588
When a new frame transmission is requested, the MAC sends out the preamble and SFD,
followed by the data. The preamble is defined as 7 bytes of 0b10101010 pattern, and the
SFD is defined as 1 byte of 0b10101011 pattern. The collision window is defined as 1 slot
time (512 bit times for 10/100 Mbit/s Ethernet). The jam pattern generation is applicable only
to Half-duplex mode, not to Full-duplex mode.
In MII mode, if a collision occurs at any time from the beginning of the frame to the end of
the CRC field, the MAC sends a 32-bit jam pattern of 0x5555 5555 on the MII to inform all
other stations that a collision has occurred. If the collision is seen during the preamble
transmission phase, the MAC completes the transmission of the preamble and SFD and
then sends the jam pattern.
A jabber timer is maintained to cut off the transmission of Ethernet frames if more than 2048
(default) bytes have to be transferred. The MAC uses the deferral mechanism for flow
control (back pressure) in Half-duplex mode. When the application requests to stop
receiving frames, the MAC sends a JAM pattern of 32 bytes whenever it senses the
reception of a frame, provided that transmit flow control is enabled. This results in a collision
and the remote station backs off. The application requests flow control by setting the BPA bit
(bit 0) in the ETH_MACFCR register. If the application requests a frame to be transmitted,
then it is scheduled and transmitted even when back pressure is activated. Note that if back
pressure is kept activated for a long time (and more than 16 consecutive collision events
occur) then the remote stations abort their transmissions due to excessive collisions. If IEEE
1588 time stamping is enabled for the transmit frame, this block takes a snapshot of the
system time when the SFD is put onto the transmit MII bus.
Transmit scheduler
The MAC is responsible for scheduling the frame transmission on the MII. It maintains the
interframe gap between two transmitted frames and follows the truncated binary exponential
backoff algorithm for Half-duplex mode. The MAC enables transmission after satisfying the
IFG and backoff delays. It maintains an idle period of the configured interframe gap (IFG bits
in the ETH_MACCR register) between any two transmitted frames. If frames to be
transmitted arrive sooner than the configured IFG time, the MII waits for the enable signal
from the MAC before starting the transmission on it. The MAC starts its IFG counter as soon
as the carrier signal of the MII goes inactive. At the end of the programmed IFG value, the
MAC enables transmission in Full-duplex mode. In Half-duplex mode and when IFG is
G x
( )
x
32
x
26
x
23
x
22
x
16
x
12
x
11
x
10
x
8
x
7
x
5
x
4
x
2
x 1
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
=