General Description

The KS8995E contains five 10/100 physical layer transceivers, five MAC (Media Access Control) units with an integrated

layer 2 switch. The device runs in two modes. The first mode

is a five port integrated switch and the second is as a five port

switch with the fifth port decoupled from the physical port. In

this mode access to the fifth MAC is provided using an MII

(Media Independent Interface).

Useful configurations include a stand alone five port switch as

well as a four port switch with a routing element connected to

the extra MII port. The additional port is also useful for a public

network interfacing.

The KS8995E is designed to reside in an unmanaged design

not requiring processor intervention. This is achieved through

I/O strapping or EEPROM programming at system reset time.

On the media side, the KS8995E supports 10BaseT,

100BaseTX and 100BaseFX as specified by the IEEE 802.3

committee.

Physical signal transmission and reception are enhanced

through use of analog circuitry that makes the design more

efficient and allows for lower power consumption and smaller

chip die size.

The major enhancements from the KS8995 to the KS8995E

are support for VLAN, traffic priority queuing, EEPROM

programming for expanded control, MDI/MDI-X auto crossover.

Data sheets and support documentation can be found on

Micrel’s web site at www.micrel.com.