Patent ID: 7047350

Claim:
An apparatus comprising: at least three serial devices; a serial data controller comprising: at least three serial ports, each serial device being coupled to one of the serial ports and each serial port comprising timing and frame synchronization selector logic coupled to receive and transmit timing signals and frame synchronization signals for controlling timing and frame synchronization of a data transmission from any one of the at least three serial ports to another one of the at least three serial ports; a plurality of data paths including at least a first data path and a second data path, each data path having a first end portion coupled to one of the serial ports and a second end portion coupled to another one of the serial ports, a first one of the serial ports being coupled to a second one of the serial ports via the first data path and to a third one of the serial ports via the second data path; and control circuitry for dynamically selecting one or more of the data paths for transmission of serial data from a transmitting serial device to a selected subset of the serial devices and not to a deselected subset of the serial devices, wherein the data remains in a serial format throughout the transmission from the transmitting serial device to the selected serial devices.