Patent ID: 8161314

Claim:
A method of frequency clocking in a processor chip, comprising the steps of: providing at least one processor chip having a plurality of processing cores, said at least one processor chip having a memory unit, and each of the processing cores having a respective clocking subsystem operating at a variable frequency; transmitting to said at least one processor chip: i) an analog signal at a given frequency, and ii) digital frequency control data for each of the clocking subsystems of the processing cores on the processor chip; said at least one processor chip: i) receiving said analog signal and said digital frequency control data, and ii) storing in the memory unit of the at least one processor chip, the digital frequency control data for the clocking subsystems of all of the cores on the processor chip, and iii) routing to each of the processing cores on said at least one processor chip, the digital frequency control data, including a desired frequency, for the clocking subsystem of said each of the processing cores; and each of the processing cores on the processor chip receiving the digital frequency control data transmitted to said each processing core from the processor chip including the desired frequency, using the desired frequency received from the processor chip to generate a ratio for converting the operating frequency of the clocking subsystem of said each of the processing cores to said desired frequency, and using said generated ratio to convert the operating frequency of the clocking subsystem of said each of the processing cores to the desired frequency.