Buffer credits

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Buffer credits, also called buffer-to-buffer credits (BBC) are used as a flow control method by Fibre Channel technology and represent the number of frames a port can store.

Each time a port transmits a frame that port's BB Credit is decremented by one; for each R RDY received, that port's BB Credit is incremented by one. If the BB Credit is zero the corresponding node cannot transmit until an R_RDY is received back.

The benefits of a large data buffer are particularly evident in long distance applications, when operating at higher data rates (2Gbit/s, 4Gbit/s), or in systems with a heavily loaded PCI bus.

[edit] See also

Fibre Channel, Host adaptor, End-to-End Credit