Patent ID: 7307951

Claim:
A method for determining in a system comprising an m-bit time counter, whether an event-occurrence time (e t n ) lies after a predetermined timeout-value (t e ), said method comprising: a stamp readout step for reading out of a time-stamp memory a stored time-stamp value (s t n ); a time-difference determination step for determining the time-difference (Δ t n ) between said time-stamp value (s t n ) and said event-occurrence time (e t n ); and a timeout-determination step for determining whether said time-difference (Δ t n ) is larger than said predetermined timeout-value (t e ), wherein said event-occurrence time (e t n ) is represented by a subset of bits of the m-bit time counter, said subset being determined by a plurality of parameters, said plurality of parameters including any two of a lower bit position (w), an upper bit-position (u), and a subset width (n), wherein (u=n+w), wherein a predetermined timeout period comprises said predetermined timeout value (t e ) multiplied by 2 w clock cycles, and wherein said lower bit-position (w) is predetermined and dependent on said predetermined timeout-value (t e ).