Patent ID: 8370551

Claim:
An arbitration system for a configurable crossbar switch device adapted for routing signals in parallel from among a first plurality of Master devices to a second plurality of Slave devices in a multiprocessing system, said system comprising: arbitration logic device associated with each respective Master device and each respective Slave device, a Slave arbitration logic device associated with a respective Slave device arbitrating access requests received in parallel from one or more Master devices requesting access to said Slave device within a first clock cycle, and selecting a first Master device according to a first control signal for access to a Slave device during a first clock cycle and generating an associated selection signal for receipt by a respective first Master arbitration logic device, and said Slave arbitration logic device further selecting a second different Master device according to a second control signal for access to the Slave device during a second clock cycle and generating an associated selection signal for receipt by a respective second Master arbitration logic device if said first Master arbitration device accepts selection of said Slave device, or selecting said first Master device to access said Slave device during the second clock cycle if said first Master device does not accept said selection of said Slave device in said first clock cycle; and, each arbitration logic device associated with a first Master device and second Master device arbitrating respective associated selection signals received from said Slave arbitration logic device and other Master device selection signals received from other Slave arbitration logic devices and selecting a respective first and second Slave device within the respective first and second clock cycles, said arbitration logic devices associated with the first Master device and second Master device generating signals to configure said crossbar switch to couple a respective first Master and first Slave device pair for routing signals within said configured crossbar switch during said first clock cycle, and generating further signals to configure said crossbar switch to further couple during the second clock cycle a second Master device and second Slave device pair for routing signals within said crossbar switch, said Slave arbitration logic device updates respective said first control and second control signals used in arbitrating requests from said Master devices during successive first and second clock cycles.