Patent ID: 8898506

Claim:
A Serial Attached SCSI (SAS) expander comprising: a host physical link (PHY) adapted to couple with a Serial Advanced Technology Attachment (SATA) Tunneling Protocol (STP) initiator device; a target PHY adapted to directly couple with a SATA end device; a buffer coupled with the host PHY and coupled with the target PHY to store commands received from the STP initiator device to be forwarded to the SATA end device; a programmable controller adapted to establish a connection between the host PHY and the target PHY to permit the transfer of commands from the STP initiator device to the SATA end device through the buffer; and a control circuit selectively coupled with the host PHY by the programmable controller and coupled with the target PHY, the control circuit adapted to detect receipt of an error status from the SATA end device in response to a command forwarded from the buffer to the SATA end device, the control circuit further adapted to communicate with the STP initiator device and with the SATA end device to clear the detected error status without involvement of the programmable controller.