Patent ID: 6720968
Filing Date: 2004-04-13
Classification: G06T

Abstract:
An image acquisition device for acquiring one or more video images from a video source, the image acquisition device comprising:an input for receiving digital video data from a video source; a buffer memory coupled to said input which stores said digital video data; and a memory controller coupled to the input and to the buffer memory, wherein the memory controller comprises: write control logic which receives said digital video data from said video source and writes said digital video data to the buffer memory; read control logic which is operable to read said digital video data from the buffer memory; and arbitration logic coupled to the write control logic and the read control logic which receives requests from each of the write control logic and the read control logic and grants buffer memory access to one of the write control logic or the read control logic; wherein the arbitration logic is operable to monitor said requests from each of the write control logic and the read control logic and dynamically allocate bandwidth to the write control logic and the read control logic based on said requests; wherein, if both a write request and a read request are pending, the arbitration logic is operable to determine if the write request can be safely delayed; wherein the arbitration logic grants buffer memory access to the read control logic if both a write request and a read request are pending and the write request can be safely delayed; wherein the arbitration logic grants buffer memory access to the write control logic if both a write request and a read request are pending and the write request cannot be safely delayed.