JPH1069703A - Information processor - Google Patents

Abstract

PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To install more magnetic disk devices without increasing disk controllers. SOLUTION: The magnetic disk devices connected to one ID are connected in series, and by reading and storing each maximum address of each magnetic disk device and adding them, a maximum address reading part 5 for showing the maximum address as one magnetic disk device, a disk changeover signal producing part 7 for selecting the corresponding magnetic disk device from the access address from the disk controller 2 and the value of maximum address reading part 5, a changeover part 6, and a disk address conversion part 4 for converting the access address from the disk controller 2 to the address of the selected magnetic disk device 8, are provided for the disk controller 2. Thus, N sets (N=1, 2, 3...) of the magnetic disk devices are connected to one disk controller 2.

Description

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION

[0001]

[0001] 1. Field of the Invention [0002] The present invention relates to information processing including a plurality of magnetic disk devices and a magnetic disk control device for controlling them.

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art FIG. 3 is a block diagram showing an example of a conventional information processing apparatus, which is an information processing apparatus comprising a system bus 1, a disk controller 2, a magnetic disk device 8 and an additional disk controller 13. . Referring to FIG. 3, the disk controller 2 is connected to an input / output interface 14 using a signal line for the magnetic disk device 8. Also, the disk controller 2
It is connected to the system bus 1 of the information processing device.

FIG. 4 shows signals of a SCSI interface which is an example of the input / output interface 14 shown in FIG. This SCSI interface is DB7-DB0
(Data signal) 15, control signal 16, and power supply 17. SCSI interface (Small Computer Sy
stem Interface), DB7 to DB0 (data signal)
The number of connected magnetic disk devices 8 is determined by the number of 15 bits.

In the example shown in FIG. 4, DB7 to DB0 (data signal) 15 are 8-bit signals, and IDs are also assigned to the disk controller 2 (in this example, ID =
7), the number of IDs that can be assigned to the magnetic disk device 8 is up to seven (in this example, ID = 0 to 6). Therefore, in the SCI interface in this case, one disk controller 2 can control up to seven magnetic disk devices 8. If it is desired to add seven or more magnetic disk devices, the disk controller 2 may be added (see the additional disk controller 13 in FIG. 4).

On the other hand, Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open No. Hei 2-254671 discloses that a plurality of magnetic disk devices are connected in series, a track formed on a magnetic disk medium is recognized as a series of series numbers, and a track after a current value is changed. The controller outputs a step signal that specifies the number of steps up to the number of steps and a direction signal that specifies whether to add or subtract the number of steps. Discloses a technique for selecting a magnetic disk device in which a corresponding track is located.

[0006]

Conventionally, when a plurality of magnetic disk drives are connected to an information processing apparatus, the limitation (capacity) of the disk controller or the standard of the interface between the disk controller and the magnetic disk drive requires the following. There is a limit to the number of disk controllers that can be controlled. For this reason, when connecting more than the number of controllers that can be controlled by the controller in order to increase the capacity of the magnetic disk device of the information processing device, the problem has been dealt with by adding disk controllers. .

Further, in the driving method disclosed in Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open No. H2-254671, tracks formed on a magnetic disk medium are recognized as a series of series numbers, and the number of steps from the current position to the number of tracks after the change is recognized. Is used in the SCSI interface, which is the mainstream of the input / output interface between the magnetic disk device and the disk controller, but no step signal is used. Can not do it.

An object of the present invention is to connect a plurality of magnetic disk drives without adding a disk controller.

[0009]

According to the present invention, in an information processing apparatus for connecting a plurality of magnetic disk devices, a maximum address of the plurality of magnetic disk devices is stored, and this address is stored in a maximum address of one magnetic disk device. And is controlled.

Also, in an information processing apparatus including a magnetic disk control device for controlling a plurality of magnetic disk devices and a disk controller for controlling the plurality of magnetic disk devices, a maximum address of the plurality of magnetic disk devices may be set. A corresponding one of the plurality of magnetic disk devices based on an access address instructed by the disk controller and a maximum address value stored in each of the disk maximum address read units; A disk switching signal generating unit that generates a selection signal for selecting a magnetic disk device based on the selection signal; and a switching unit that selects an access address instructed by the disk controller. Data to be converted to the specified address Characterized in that it comprises a disk address conversion unit. Each of the disk maximum address reading units reads the maximum addresses of the plurality of magnetic disk devices and adds the read addresses to a maximum address of one magnetic disk device.

Thus, according to the present invention, by adding the maximum addresses of the magnetic disk devices connected to one ID, the disk controller can be shown as one magnetic disk device. Therefore, a plurality of (N = 1, 2,..., N) magnetic disk devices can be connected to one ID.
N × n units (n: the number of IDs that can be controlled by one disk controller) can be controlled.

[0012]

Next, an embodiment of the present invention will be described with reference to the drawings.

FIG. 1 is a block diagram showing an embodiment of the present invention. Referring to FIG. 1, an information processing apparatus according to the present embodiment includes a system bus 1, a disk controller 2 for controlling the system bus 1 and controlling a magnetic disk controller 3, and an input of the magnetic disk controller 3 and the disk controller 2. And an output interface 14.

The magnetic disk controller 3 controls the # 0 to #N (N = 1, 2, 2) of the magnetic disk devices 8 connected in series.
The maximum address up to (3, ..., N) is read and stored,
The maximum addresses of the read magnetic disk devices 8 from # 0 to #n are added. Then, the maximum addresses of a plurality of magnetic disk devices are read and added, and each disk maximum address reading unit 5 which regards the read address as the maximum address of one magnetic disk device, the access address commanded by the disk controller 2 and each disk maximum address reading unit 5
Disk switching signal generator 7 for generating a selection signal for selecting a corresponding magnetic disk device from a plurality of magnetic disk devices based on the maximum address value stored in
A switching unit 6 for selecting a corresponding magnetic disk device based on the generated selection signal; and a disk address converting unit 4 for converting an access address instructed by the disk controller 2 to a specified address of the selected magnetic disk device. It is comprised including.

Next, the operation of the information processing apparatus thus configured will be described with reference to FIGS. FIG.
FIG. 3 is a diagram illustrating an address space of each magnetic disk device and an address space seen from a disk controller according to the present invention.

First, when power is supplied to the magnetic disk control device 3, the maximum address reading unit 5 of each disk drives all the magnetic disk devices 8 (# 0 to # 0) connected in series.
#N) is read and stored. In the present embodiment, as shown in FIG. 2, for example, the address space 9 of the magnetic disk device # 0 is 0X0000 to 0X1000, and the address space 10 of the magnetic disk device # 1 is 0X.
0000 to 0X1500. Then, the address space 11 of the magnetic disk device of #N is set to 0X0000 to 0X0.
500.

Subsequently, by adding these read address values, 0X0000 to 0X60 are stored in the address space 12 of ID = 0 which can be seen from the disk controller 2.
00 is generated. Thereby, the disk controller 2
Represents the I connected via the input / output interface 14.
The maximum address of the magnetic disk controller 3 with D = 0 is read. Then, from the disk controller 2 side,
The magnetic disk devices # 0 to #N can be regarded as one magnetic disk device having the maximum address: 0X6000.

Next, when accessing the magnetic disk device 8 from the disk controller 2, for example, 0X1100 is output as an access address to the magnetic disk controller 3 via the input / output interface 14.
The disk switching generation unit 7 which has input the access address: 0X1100 reads the magnetic disk device 8 having the access address: 0X1100 of # 1 from the address space 12 of ID = 0, which is read from the disk controller side of each magnetic disk device previously read. Recognize that this is an area. As a result, a signal for selecting the # 1 magnetic disk device 8 is output to the switching unit 6. The switching unit 6 performs switching so that the # 1 magnetic disk device 8 can be selected based on the signal.

Further, the disk address conversion unit 4 which has input the access address: 0X1100 from the disk controller 2 uses the maximum address space of each magnetic disk device which has been read in advance to access the address: 0X110.
0 is the address of the magnetic disk device 8 of # 1: 0X10
It is converted to 0 and output to the switching unit 6. As a result, from the disk controller 2, the access address: 0X11
When the data transfer from 00 is performed, the magnetic disk controller 3 sets the address of the magnetic disk device 8 of # 1 to 0X.
0100 and can be transferred.

As described above, in the present invention, by reading the maximum address of the connected magnetic disk devices 8, the configuration becomes the same as the configuration in which each magnetic disk device is connected in series, and the theory is infinite. Can be increased.
That is, in one disk controller 2, the number N (N = 1, 2, 3, 3) of magnetic disk devices 8 connected in series
...) × ID number n (n = 1, 2, 3,...) That can be controlled by one disk controller 2 (number of connections = N)
× n).

Therefore, from the disk controller 2,
It can be regarded as one magnetic disk device, and the storage capacity of the disk can be increased only by adding the magnetic disk device 8 (different storage capacity is possible) without adding the disk controller 2.

[0022]

As described above, the information processing apparatus of the present invention reads and adds each maximum address of the serially connected magnetic disk devices, so that the disk controller can make the magnetic disk device appear as one magnetic disk device. There is an effect that a plurality of magnetic disk devices can be connected without adding a disk controller.

[Brief description of the drawings]

FIG. 1 is a block diagram showing an embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 2 is a diagram illustrating an address space of each magnetic disk device and an address space seen from a disk controller according to the present invention.

FIG. 3 is a block diagram showing an example of connection of a conventional magnetic disk drive.

FIG. 4 is a block diagram illustrating an example of an input / output interface of FIG. 3;

[Explanation of symbols]

DESCRIPTION OF SYMBOLS 1 System bus 2 Disk controller 3 Magnetic disk control unit 4 Disk address conversion unit 5 Maximum address reading unit of each disk 6 Switching unit 7 Disk switching signal generation unit 8 Magnetic disk device 9 Address space of magnetic disk device # 0 10 Magnetic disk device Address space of # 1 11 Address space of magnetic disk device #N 12 Address space of ID = 0 seen from disk controller 13 Additional disk controller 14 I / O interface 15 Data signal 16 Control signal 17 Power supply

Claims (3)

[Claims] In an information processing apparatus for connecting a plurality of magnetic disk devices, a maximum address of the plurality of magnetic disk devices is stored, and this address is regarded as a maximum address of one magnetic disk device and controlled. An information processing apparatus characterized by the above-mentioned. 2. An information processing apparatus comprising: a magnetic disk control device for controlling a plurality of magnetic disk devices; and a disk controller for controlling the plurality of magnetic disk devices, wherein a maximum address of the plurality of magnetic disk devices is A maximum address reading unit for each disk to be read;
A disk for generating a selection signal for selecting a corresponding magnetic disk device from the plurality of magnetic disk devices based on an access address instructed by the disk controller and a maximum address value stored in each of the disk maximum address reading units; A switching signal generating unit, a switching unit for selecting a corresponding magnetic disk device based on the selection signal, and a disk address conversion for converting an access address instructed by the disk controller to a designated address of the selected magnetic disk device. And an information processing apparatus. 3. The information processing apparatus according to claim 2, wherein each of the disk maximum address reading units reads the maximum addresses of the plurality of magnetic disk devices, and regards them as the maximum address of one magnetic disk device. .