US Patent 7362771 Reduced latency FIFO

A First-In-First-Out (FIFO) block to buffer a packet having a size is presented. The FIFO block includes a receiver to receive a data frame including the packet and overhead information, and to extract the packet from the data frame. A buffer has a plurality of memory locations to store the packet in a FIFO configuration. A buffer manager, in response to detecting a buffer low packet condition, stalls reads of the packet from the buffer.