Apparatus for repowering and monitoring serial links

摘要

A computer system employs a repeater unit which repowers a serial channel link. The repeater unit also monitors and records non-idle usage and errors for both directions of the repeated serial link. Non-idle usage of the serial link is recorded as a number of seconds that non-idle traffic flowed in the link over a given period of time. Link serial code violations and loss-of-light transitions are also counted. Link code violations are counted with an accuracy that permits targeted serial link bit-error rates, of no more than one bit error in approximately two months, to be accurately verified for the first time in a normal customer environment. The repeater unit permits an attached monitoring computer to read and reset all its usage and error counters as often as required by the customer, and without losing any counts of any counted event. The attached monitoring computer can also instruct the repeater unit to send certain diagnostic patterns or no-light and/or perform a remote wrap function to assist with link problem determinations.