The present invention is a
system on
chip architecture having scalable, distributed
processing and memory capabilities through a plurality of
processing layers. In a preferred embodiment, a distributed
processing layer processor comprises a plurality of processing
layers, a processing layer controller, and a central
direct memory access controller. The processing layer controller manages the scheduling of tasks and distribution of processing tasks to each processing layer. Within each processing layer, a plurality of pipelined processing units (PUs), specially designed for conducting a defined set of processing tasks, are in communication with a plurality of program memories and data memories. One application of the present invention is in a
media gateway that is designed to enable the communication of media across circuit switched and
packet switched networks. The hardware
system architecture of the said novel gateway is comprised of a plurality of DPLPs, referred to as Media Engines that are interconnected with a
Host Processor or Packet Engine, which, in turn, is in communication with interfaces to networks. Each of the PUs within the processing
layers of the Media Engines are specially designed to perform a class of media processing specific tasks, such as line echo cancellation, encoding or decoding data, or tone signaling.