Patent ID: 7080162

Claim:
An apparatus comprising: a transmit buffer coupled to at least one transmit data line, the transmit buffer to receive data from a host computer and to temporarily store the data before transmitting the data over the transmit data line to a physical link of a data network; a receive buffer coupled to at least one receive data line, the receive buffer to receive data from the physical link of the data network over the receive data line and to temporarily store the data before providing the data to the host computer; an array of communication registers; a data register of the array, the data register coupled to the receive buffer, wherein repeated reads from the data register causes data to be read from the receive buffer; and a status register of the array, the status register to store data identifying a collision of data on the physical link of the data network, the status register readable from the host computer, the status register also to store at least one bit signifying an interrupt state in at least one of a read and a write operation.