Patent ID: 8082374

Claim:
An information processing apparatus comprising: a communication processing unit configured to communicate with an external communication device; and a data processing unit configured to communicate with the communication processing unit via a wire data communication path and to carry out data processing, wherein: the communication processing unit includes: (a) a first-in, first-out memory configured to temporarily store data transmitted and received between the communication device and the data processing unit, and (b) a control unit configured to control data writing in and data reading from the memory, such that: (i) the control unit determines whether a command request received from the communication device is a data writing request or a data reading request and notifies the data processing unit about the type of the received command, (ii) when the command request received from the communication device is the data reading request, the control unit acquires data from the first-in, first-out memory and transmits the data to the communication device, (iii) when the command request received from the communication device is the data writing request, the control unit stores data in the first-in, first-out memory, acquires data from the first-in, first-out memory in response to a request from the data processing unit, and outputs the data to the data processing unit.