Broadband Communications Part I

Topic X Broadband
Communications
(Part I)
OBJECTIVE
On completion of this topic, you should be able to:
1.
Describe the main features of Gigabit Ethernet.
2.
List and describe the advantages of using Gigabit Ethernet.
3.
Discuss the main features and advantages of ATM.
4.
Explain the concept of statistical multiplexing and multiplexing

gain.
5.
Outline the layered implementation of Broadband Integrated

Service Digital Networks (B-ISDN) over ATM.
6.
Describe the ATM cell header structure and the virtual path
concept.
7.
Describe the service classes supported by ATM and explain the

functions of different types of AAL protocols.
8.
Discuss how ATM can support IP.
9.
Describe the concept of IP over SONET.
X OVERVIEW
This topic describes the general principles and structures of two advanced high
speed backbone network technologies, and gives you the chance to start
evaluating their potential. Well start our discussion by defining what we mean
by high speed networks, and then well introduce the two advanced high speed
networks. The first, Gigabit Ethernet, is an upgraded version of the 802.3
22 X
TOPIC 2 BROADBAND COMMUNICATIONS (PART I)
Ethernet. Gigabit Ethernet has the advantage of simple backward compatibility

with older LAN technologies.
In the remainder of this topic, well focus our study on a newer technology
Asynchronous Transfer Mode (ATM) which has been adopted as the
supporting technology for future Broadband Integrated Service Digital Networks
(B-ISDN). Since ATM is very different from existing LAN technology, well
spend some time considering its main features and benefits.
Youll learn about the B-ISDN layered model based on ATM, and the header
structure of ATM cells is then described. Youll be introduced to the concept of
virtual paths that simplify call admission and network management. After that,
the ATM adaptation layer, which converts the higher layer service to the ATM
layer, is discussed.
The service classes supported by ATM networks are introduced next, and the
issues of traffic management and control are investigated. Then, well illustrate
how to integrate IP with ATM.
Well draw a simple comparison between the Gigabit Ethernet and ATM, and
introduce a competing technology, IP over SONET. Finally, well briefly
overview how to offer IP/ATM integrated services over xDSL technologies.
The self-tests in this topic are designed to help you understand the concepts and
performance of high speed networks. The summary and glossary at the end of
this topic should help you as you work through this topic and as you do your
revision.
INTRODUCTION
We begin our discussion here in this topic with high speed backbone networks,
the infrastructure to support the growing bandwidth-greedy applications.
First, we need to ask an obvious but important question: what are high speed
networks? Well, if you think about it, you will agree that the answer changes
with time. Recall that modems in the 1980s were still running at speeds of
300~1200 bps, and networks (in the early 1980s) carrying a data rate of around 10
Mbps were considered to be high speed. In fact, networks such as Ethernet
could easily support hundreds of users in a local area with applications such as
email and file transfer.
TOPIC 2 BROADBAND COMMUNICATIONS (PART I) W
23
The introduction of the World Wide Web (WWW) in the 1990s, however, caused
explosive growth in data traffic over the Internet. The old high speed networks
were no longer sufficient to support the continuous growth in traffic volume. In
addition, there were increasing demands to support multimedia applications
over long distances; for example, to set up a video conference between two
parties in the US and Hong Kong. To support these new types of services (such
as video), advanced compression techniques to pack the data but also new
high speed networks to transfer the information needed to be developed.
Table 2.1 below tracks how the meaning of high speed networks has evolved
over time. This is similar to the evolution of computers, in which faster and faster
CPUs like 8086, 80286, and so on, have been developed until today, when the
Pentium III has captured the market.
Table 2.1: The meaning of high speed networks changes with the times
Year
High speed network
1960s
64 kbps
1970s
1 Mbps
1980s
10 Mbps
Early 1990s
100 Mbps
Today
1 Gbps
2005
> 10 Gbps
Youll be introduced to two currently-emerging high speed networks in this

topic: Gigabit Ethernet and Asynchronous Transfer Mode (ATM). These new
networking technologies have enjoyed a great deal of attention in the LAN and
WAN arenas, respectively. Youll be introduced to the basics of each of these
high speed networks here in the study topic, and then referred to articles and
Web pages for a more detailed description.
In our first topic, however, we take a closer look at the idea of a high speed
backbone network.
24 X
HIGH SPEED BACKBONE NETWORKS

There is a growing demand for multimedia applications over networks. In fact,
entertainment is the major driving force for bandwidth-hungry applications. One
day-to-day example is interactive TV (iTV) service, which actually comprises
MPEG-2 video streams with a bandwidth requirement of about 3 Mbps. (Since
MPEG-2 is a variable bit rate coding standard ranging from 1.5 Mbps to 9.8
Mbps, 3 Mbps is only a typical value.) Now, suppose you live in a residential
building with 100 families subscribing to iTV services. The backbone network
between this residential building and the video service centre providing the
programming will require a bandwidth of at least 300 Mbps. If there are 1000
subscribers, the bandwidth requirement jumps to 3 Gbps. You can see, therefore,
that the backbone networks of the future must have sufficient capacity to handle
this growing traffic demand.
Lets look at another example. The use of network-licensed software is very
common in large corporations and organizations (such as the OUHK). Networklicensed software can reduce costs and provide flexibility. When network traffic
is heavily localized (as it is at the OUHK campus), a single high speed LAN (e.g.,
fast Ethernet) can easily support hundreds of users. Now suppose we extend the
concept of using network-licensed software a step further: consider a very basic
computer running applications, via high speed connections, located on remote
powerful servers. This is basically the idea of Network Computers (NC).
Although the success of NCs is still debatable, its potential application cannot
simply be ignored. Again, such an application will require high speed backbone
networks to interconnect users and servers spread over wide areas.
The above discussion suggests that new high speed networks are needed to
support the growing traffic. If we agree this is the case, then network managers
must always face some challenging questions: is it worth upgrading the existing
network with new technology? What is the technology to use? Is the new
technology an evolution or a revolution of existing networks? What are the shortterm and long-term costs and returns for a new technology?
In the following topics, you will learn about two emerging high speed networks:
Gigabit Ethernet and ATM. Gigabit Ethernet is basically a speeded-up version of
the legacy Ethernet LAN. On the other hand, ATM is a completely new
networking technology, which aims to revolutionize existing networks. As time
progresses, Gigabit Ethernet and ATM have found their own market positions in
LAN and WAN environments, respectively. We shall start our discussion with
Gigabit Ethernet, since most of you have already encountered Ethernet in your
study of other computer networks.
25
GIGABIT ETHERNET (IEEE 802.3Z)

Ethernet is by far the most popular LAN: industry estimates indicate that over 50
million Ethernet nodes have been installed worldwide. Given Ethernets great
popularity, engineers are working hard to improve the speed of Ethernet without
making significant changes to the existing hardware it runs on. This has led to
the development of a fast version of Ethernet which has quickly captured the 100
Mbps LAN market.
With the increase in multimedia applications over networks, however, even 100
Mbps networks have still been unable to keep pace with the rapid growth in
traffic volume. This has provided the motivation for the design of networks with
speeds beyond 100 Mbps. Yet because of the overwhelming success of Ethernet
(more than 85% of all installed network connections are Ethernet), engineers
wanted to push the speed of Ethernet to 1 Gbps. This led to the new Gigabit
Ethernet standard IEEE 802.3z.
What is Gigabit Ethernet?

Gigabit Ethernet is basically an Ethernet running at a speed of 1 Gbps. Gigabit
Ethernet uses the same Ethernet frame format and media access control
technology (CSMA/CD) as other members of the 802.3 Ethernet family. It also
uses the same 802.3 full-duplex Ethernet technology and 802.3 flow control. The
whole design philosophy behind Gigabit Ethernet is to maintain compatibility
with the many millions of existing Ethernet and Fast Ethernet connections
installed worldwide.
As is usually the case for other emerging technologies, however, there is no
single reference to provide the whole picture for Gigabit Ethernet. Therefore, you
need to read from different sources to assemble the necessary range of
background information. Please begin by reading the following three articles.
26 X
READING 2.1
Moorthy, V (1997) Survey of Gigabit Ethernet, University of Ohio
<http://www.cis.ohio-state.edu/~jain/cis788-97/gigabit_ethernet />
Although this paper was written before the approval of the current
standard (1997), it provides a solid background on the development
and basic concept of Gigabit Ethernet.
READING 2.2
Introduction to Gigabit Ethernet, Technical Document from Cisco
Systems
http://www.cisco.com/warp/public/cc/techno/media/
lan/gig/tech/ gigbt_tc.htm
This brief article provides a technical overview of Gigabit Ethernet,
including its architecture, standards and topologies.
27
READING 2.3
White paper: Gigabit Ethernet Overview updated May 1999, Gigabit
Ethernet Alliance http://www.10gea.org/Tech-whitepapers .htm
The Gigabit Ethernet Alliance is an open forum whose purpose is to
promote industry cooperation in the development of Gigabit Ethernet.
This white paper provides a brief overview of Gigabit Ethernet,
including the advantages of Gigabit Ethernet, Gigabit Ethernet
technology fundamentals and network migration scenarios.
As Gigabit Ethernet is still under development, you are encouraged to
visit the Gigabit Ethernet Alliance website for updated information.
There are also a couple of optional readings you might want to look
up if you want more details or are particularly interested in this
subject:
(Optional) FAQ about Gigabit Ethernet, Gigabit Ethernet Alliance,
http://www.10gea.org/tech-faqs.htm
This website contains common FAQ about Gigabit Ethernet. Interested
readers can refer to them for further information.
(Optional) Philippe Ginier-Gillet and Christopher T Di Minico,
1000BASE-T: Gigabit Ethernet Over Category 5 Copper Cabling, 3Com

<http://www.3com.com/other/pdfs/infra/corpinfo/en_US/5030470
2.pdf>
This paper provides the technical understanding of the fundamentals
of 1000BASE-T - Gigabit Ethernet run over Category 5 Copper Cable.
After the above readings, it is time to test your understanding of the material.
Please do your best to answer the following questions.
28 X
ACTIVITY 2.1
1.
What are the main advantages of using Gigabit Ethernet?
2.
Does Gigabit Ethernet follow the CSMA/CD protocol? What

are some of the new features added in Gigabit Ethernet?
3.
What are the transmission media used in Gigabit Ethernet?

Discuss the possible use of UTP to support Gigabit Ethernet.
4.
How would you rate the performance of Gigabit Ethernet in

terms of throughput efficiency?
After the successful introduction of Gigabit Ethernet, the industry is pushing a

step further extending bandwidth of Ethernet to 10 Gbits. A new consortium
known as 10 Gigabit Ethernet Alliance (www.10gea.org) is formed to support the
advancement of the 10 Gigabit Ethernet standard. Please refer to 10 Gigabit
Ethernet Alliance for further information.
Reading
(Optional) 10 Gigabit Ethernet An Introduction, 10 Gigabit Ethernet Alliance
<http://www.10gea.org/Tech-whitepapers.htm>
This paper introduces the information on the technologies used by emerging
standard for 10 Gigabit Ethernet.
After reading the assigned articles you may already have concluded that Gigabit
Ethernet is a great solution for broadband networking. You are quite right in a
certain sense. Due to the low cost and success of Ethernet and fast Ethernet, it is
expected that Gigabit Ethernet will quickly come to dominate the backbone
market. However, Gigabit Ethernet is currently still limited to LAN
environments because the CSMA/CD protocols are not scalable to high speed
wide area networks (WANs). Lets look at this issue in a bit more detail.
There are two fundamental criteria for the speed and efficiency of networks:
1.
Delay: the roundtrip time for transmitting information between the

transmitter and the receiver;
2.
Bandwidth: the number of bits transmitted per second.
29
The bandwidth delay product (B

BDP) is the product of these two parameters.
In the data link layer, BDP represents the maximum amount of allowed
unacknowledged data inside a network. According to IEEE 802.3 specifications
(10 base-T), this allows for a total cable length of 2500 m with four repeaters. The
worst-case signal propagation delay is 50 ms, which corresponds to a frame of
size 500 bits (= 10 Mbps 50 ms) at 10 Mbps. As network speed increases, the
minimum frame length must increase or the maximum cable length must
decrease proportionally.
Now consider a network operating at 1 Gbps over a distance of 250 km and a
propagation delay of 5 ms. If we use the CSMA/CD protocol, the minimum
frame size will become (1 Gbps 5 ms) = 5 Mbits, which is unreasonably large.
Technically speaking, the protocol is limited by the large bandwidth-delay
products. In high speed WANs, this kind of feedback control protocol is
inefficient.
Recent rapid increases in multimedia applications such as video and voice over
the networks have introduced various applications that impose different
performance requirements on the network bearer service, which is known as
Quality of Service (Q
QoS). In general, QoS is measured in terms of delays,
bandwidth and packet loss. However, Ethernet was originally designed to
transfer data that were not being delivered in real time. Despite the enhanced
speed of Gigabit Ethernet, the underlying CSMA/CD protocol still does not
provide any rigid boundaries on the maximum delays for transmitted data.
To provide necessary delay guarantees, new protocols must be added to existing
protocols. One such new protocol is RSVP (Resource reSerVation Protocol),
which was developed to enable these data networks to support real-time
applications. The issues of providing Internet QoS will be discussed in other
topic.
All of these additional efforts were made because existing datagram networks
were not designed to support real time traffic. Instead of adding new features to
enhance existing networks, a more revolutionary solution is to invent new
networks to support multi-type service. This led to the development of
Broadband Integrated Services Digital Networks (B
B-ISDN), which will be
discussed in the following topic.
30 X
ASYNCHRONOUS TRANSFER MODE (ATM)

At present, separate networks are built for specific purposes such as telephone,
television, data, and so on. Each network has its own protocols, equipment and
transmission facilities. All of these networks cost money and have associated
maintenance overheads. However, the objective of all these networks is the same:
to transfer information. Integrating these networks together that is, creating a
single network to cope with all the different service requirements might
reduce these costs. Broadband Integrated Service Digital Networks (B-ISDN) was
conceived as an all-purpose digital network to achieve this aim.
What about the Internet? you may ask. We can transfer files, send email, talk
with others using IP phone and watch Real Video over the Internet. Is the
Internet going to be the B-ISDN? The answer is: yes and no. There is no doubt
that the Internet is the dominant network in the world, and that it can achieve
most of the aims listed for the B-ISDN. However, the Internet, since it is a
datagram network, is not designed to support the Quality of Service required in
real-time applications such as video. For instance, as you likely know from
experience, the quality of Real Video is still far from satisfactory compared to TV.
New protocols have been introduced to improve such services, but there is still a
fundamental limit to the QoS that can be supported on the existing Internet. A
more forward-looking approach is to build new high speed networks for the next
generation of the Internet.
The
International
Telecommunications
Union
Telecommunication
Standardisation Section (ITU-T) is responsible for defining the concept,
management, services and technology for B-ISDN. Asynchronous Transfer Mode
(ATM) has been adopted by the ITU-T as the technology to support B-ISDN. In
simple terms, ATM is a connection-oriented, packet-switching technique that
uses short fixed-size packets called cells as its unit of transfer. An ATM cell
consists of a 5-byte header field and a 48-byte information field. The size of the
cell was chosen to balance the requirements of latency and protocol efficiency.
Each cell contains addressing and control information so that switching functions
can be directly implemented in the hardware instead of working with cells in the
software. This greatly reduces the switching complexity and processing load at
the intermediate switching nodes that are essential for high speed networking. In
addition, cells provide a powerful mechanism for supporting different service
characteristics over a common communication infrastructure. By segmenting
traffic into these fixed-size cells, we can multiplex traffic from different services
to the same network.
31
In addition, ATM is a connection-oriented technique in which end-to-end paths

are established prior to the beginning of the information transfer. The routing of
cells is thus greatly simplified because all cells going to the same destination are
delivered in sequence and follow the same path. The ATM protocol encompasses
features of both the data link layer (layer 2) and the network layer (layer 3) of the
OSI model.
ATM is an attempt to combine the benefits of both circuit switching and packet
switching in an integrated network. However, it is a compromise in that it is not
designed specifically for any particular application. We do not (or should not)
expect ATM to handle a particular application as efficiently or as cost-effectively
as a network specially designed for such a service. Instead, ATM is intended to
allow the integration of all these different types of services and yet still provide
satisfactory performance.
The ups and downs of ATM

The concept of ATM was proposed in the late 1980s. The promised advantages of
ATM have attracted much attention from the communication industry.
Consequently, the ATM Forum (<www.atmforum.com>), a consortium of
companies, was formed to accelerate the definition of ATM technology. Its
membership is made up of network equipment providers, semiconductor
manufacturers, service providers, carriers, as well as end users. The ATM Forum
is not a standards body, but its specifications are passed up to ITU-T for
approval. The ITU-T standards body fully recognizes the ATM Forum as a
credible working group.
The ITU-T issued a first series of recommendations specifying the details of ATM
for use in B-ISDN in the early 1990s. Much effort has been spent on ATM
research, and new standards continued to roll out until 1995. Unfortunately,
ATM gradually lost its momentum after 1995. There are several reasons for this:
1.
Many implementation problems, such as buffer dimensioning and

bandwidth allocation, arose during the development of services in ATM.
2.
The high cost of ATM desktop interfaces, when compared to competing

technologies such as Fast Ethernet, slowed down the general acceptance of
ATM.
3.
The aims of ATM were too aggressive and it tried to support too many
services. This slowed down the process of defining standards.
4.
Complicated internetworking with existing LANs turned away potential

customers.
32 X
5.
The explosive popularity of WWW made the Internet the de facto global
network. This made it harder to persuade customers to change to ATM.
Although ATM lost its position on the battlefield in LAN environments, it

continues to enjoy its dominance in the high speed backbone WAN market.
Various ATM-based WANs have been set up in the world (predominately in the
USA). For instance, most major Telecom companies such as AT&T, MCI etc. have
built their own ATM backbone WANs. PCCWHKT IMS also has a 622 Mbps
ATM ring network supporting broadband services throughout in some countries.
This enables each Netvigator 1.5 M Ultraline subscriber to have 1.5 Mbps
dedicated bandwidth to connect to the Internet.
The popularity of the WWW has led to increasing demand for supporting realtime applications such as video conferencing over the Internet. The ability of
ATM to provide QoS attracted attention from the industry again in 1998. In
addition, the wide deployment of ATM WANs provides the necessary large
bandwidth (2.4 Gbps ATM is already available) for future bandwidth-greedy
Internet services. This has led to the idea of running Internet Protocol on top of
the ATM protocol (also known as IP-over-ATM) that is, using ATM as the
underlying network to support Internet service. This issue will be addressed in a
later part of this topic.
As you have learned, a great deal of research has been carried out on the next
generation Internet. One such effort is very-high-performance Backbone Network
Service (vBNS) which is currently implemented as an IP-over-ATM network.
In addition, there are also growing demands for accessing the Internet through
wireless communications. This has motivated the development of Wireless ATM
to support multimedia services in wireless situations. Wireless ATM represents
an effort to merge different technologies together to generate new solutions for
application. Wireless ATM will be covered in other topic.
Virtual circuit switching

ATM is basically a virtual circuit switching technology. Virtual circuit switching
can be viewed as a mixture of both circuit switching and packet switching. As in
packet switching, the message is divided into several packets and, instead of
being transmitted to the destination through different routes as in packet
switching, all the packets are transmitted through the same route and arrive at
the destination in sequence. This is called virtual circuit switching because, from
the users point of view, they are transmitting the data on a dedicated circuit.
However, this circuit is not private; it can be shared by a number of
connections. By using a fixed route, the size of headers can be greatly reduced, as
33
only the virtual circuit needs to be identified, but not the exact address of the
destination. Also, with the help of a fixed route between source and destination,
the packets can arrive in the same sequence as they were sent from the senders
side.
Please read the following reading to refresh your memory of different switching
technologies circuit switching, packet switching and virtual circuit switching.
READING 2.4
Walrand and Varaiya (1996) High-performance Communication
Networks, Morgan Kaufmann: Section 2.5.2, pp. 6065.
This reading reviews the concepts of circuit switching, packet
switching and virtual circuit switching.
Time division multiplexing v. statistical multiplexing

An ATM network must be able to transfer multiple types of traffic with diverse
traffic characteristics. One critical requirement of ATM is its ability to carry traffic
efficiently over high speed (at least 100 Mbps) networks. The underlying
multiplexing technique in ATM is statistical multiplexing; this technique enables
ATM to transfer variable bit rate (VBR) traffic efficiently over networks. In this
section, youll be introduced to the basic concepts related to statistical
multiplexing.
Suppose we have N traffic sources arriving at an output link, and each source
temporarily stores its packets in a buffer. In TDM, each source is assigned a
dedicated time slot in a periodic frame to transmit its packets in the buffer. The
identity of the packets can then be distinguished by their positions in the frame.
TDM is widely used in circuit-switched networks. Although TDM is simple, it
may not fully utilize the available link capacity. As shown in Figure 2.1(a), there
is no packet from source 2 in the second frame, so that dedicated time slot will be
unused. Similarly, the first slot in the third frame is wasted. Thus, we cannot
fully utilize the link capacity of the output.
34 X
Figure 2.1(a): Time slots are unused in time division multiplexing
Suppose the restriction of dedicated time slots is removed, however, and other
sources are allowed to transmit as long as their buffers are non-empty. In Figure
2.1(b), the second packet from source 3 is allowed to transmit after the second
packet from source 1. Then no time slot is wasted, resulting in higher utilization
of the link capacity. In fact, there are no empty slots as long as the sources have
packets to transmit. This is known as statistical multiplexing (or asynchronous
time division multiplexing) because the slots are no longer used synchronously.
This is the reason why the term asynchronous is used in ATM. However, each
packet must carry an address to identify itself because its identity can no longer
be inferred by its time slot position in a frame.
Figure 2.1(b): All the time slots are used in statistical multiplexing
Statistical multiplexing gain

You can see from this basic description, therefore, how statistical multiplexing
can be more bandwidth-efficient than time-division multiplexing. Statistical
multiplexing is particularly well suited to applications with bursty traffic
characteristics, i.e. traffic with large variations in bit rate. To support several
variable-bit-rate (VBR) connections sharing a link without packet loss, the safest
way is to provide a bandwidth equal to the sum of their peak bit rate. However,
this will be an over-allocation of bandwidth in most cases because it is unlikely
that all the traffic will transmit simultaneously at the peak rate. Ideally, we
35
would like to allocate sufficient bandwidth (less than the sum of peak rates) to
support multiplexed traffic without losses.
In Figure 2.2, you can see three traffic sources multiplexing into an output link.
The sum of their peak rates and the sum of their average rates are 5 Mb/s and 2.5
Mb/s. To ensure no packet losses, we can allocate a bandwidth of 5 Mb/s to the
output link. However, since not all three traffic sources transmit at their peak bit
rates simultaneously, a link capacity of 3 Mb/s is enough to serve the
multiplexed sources. That is, we have a saving of (5 3) = 2 Mb/s.
The ratio of total input capacity to the total output capacity is defined as the
multiplexing gain. In this example, the multiplexing gain is (5/3). In general, the
multiplexing gain depends on the number of traffic sources and traffic
characteristics. For ideal cases, we would like to have the link capacity equal to
the sum of average rates of multiplexed traffic.
On the other hand, weve lost some simplicity of implementation by using
statistical multiplexing. We need to have additional overhead such as packet
labels to identify source or destination addresses. This requires more complicated
network controls to ensure the correct routing of packets. In addition, the actual
savings in bandwidth are highly dependent on the traffic characteristics. If the
traffic is very smooth, we will not see many savings in bandwidth. Therefore, we
have a trade-off between complexity and multiplexing gains.
Figure 2.2: Statistical multiplexing
In any case, you can see now how statistical multiplexing is used in ATM to
transfer multiple traffic streams over the networks. The following sections
describe some more of the basic concepts behind ATM.
36 X
SELF-TEST 2.1
What are the advantages and disadvantages of using statistical
multiplexing over time division multiplexing?
Benefits of ATM
Several benefits of ATM are described in the following reading. Please go
through them carefully.
READING 2.5
The International Engineering Consortium, Asynchronous Transfer
Mode (ATM) fundamentals, Web ProForum Tutorial, Section 2, pp.
14.
<http://www.webproforum.com/atm_fund/>
SELF-TEST 2.2
List and explain the advantages of using ATM over existing LANs.
The layered B-ISDN model for ATM

You have learned that a layered architecture has the advantage of each layer
performing a well-defined function. The layered B-ISDN protocol model for
ATM is shown in Figure 2.3, which defines the function of each layer.
37
Figure 2.3: The B-ISDN ATM protocol reference model
This model contains four planes:

1.
a user plane to transport user information;
2.
a control plane mainly containing signalling information;
3.
a management plane to maintain the network and perform operational

functions; and
4.
plane management to manage different planes.
For each plane, separate layers perform specific functions. Lets look at the lowest
three layers: the physical layer, which mainly transports information (bits/cells);
the ATM layer, which mainly performs switching/routing and multiplexing; and
the ATM adaptation layer (AAL), which adapts service information to the ATM
stream.
The physical layer is responsible for the correct transmission and reception of bits
on the physical medium. Common physical media such as UTP, coaxial cable
and optical fibre can support ATM.
The ATM layer is fully independent of the physical layer. ATM provides a
connection-oriented cell switching service using the VP concept. The ATM layer
is primarily responsible for the generation of the cell header and the functions
associated with the header, such as the switching and routing of cells, flow
control, congestion notification, bit error detection in the header, etc. Some of the
main functions of ATM headers will be explained in the next section.
The ATM Adaptation Layer (AAL) is an end-to-end protocol that provides the
interface between the ATM Layer and higher layer protocols and applications. It
is the capabilities of the AAL that make ATM able to support a wide range of
services. We shall discuss AAL in a later part of this topic.
38 X
ATM header structure

Do you recall that each ATM cell consists of a 5-byte header and 48-byte data?
Distinct from TCP/IP, no error protection or flow control is implemented on a
link-by-link basis in ATM networks because ATM is assumed to operate over
links with very low BER (in the order of 10-9). This significantly reduces the size
of ATM headers. Furthermore, to guarantee fast processing in the network, very
few functions are installed in ATM headers.
The header structure at the UNI (User Network Interface) is shown in Figure 2.4.
Figure 2.4: ATM header structure at the UNI
The component fields in the header and their functions are:

Generic Flow Control (GFC) implements the flow control mechanism on

the user-network interface (UNI).
Virtual Path Identifier/Virtual Channel Identifier (VPI/VCI) identifies the

virtual connection and routes the cell to the correct virtual channel. ATM
virtual circuits comprise virtual paths (VP) and virtual channels (VC). A VC
is a one-way channel for the transport of cells; a VP is a collection of VCs.
Payload Type (PT) distinguishes between different types of information in

the 48-byte payload field.
Cell Loss Priority (CLP) differentiates the priority of a cell (CLP = 0 or 1)

subject to discarding by the network. Lower priority cells may be marked for
discarding during congestion.
Header Error Control (HEC) protects the header from error.
39
More detailed information concerning ATM headers can be found in the

following reading. Keep in mind that the header structure in NNI (NetworkNetwork Interface) is similar to the header structure in UNI except the GFC is
missing and the length of VPI is increased to 12 bits.
READING 2.6a
Tanenbaum, A (1996) Computer Networks, Prentice Hall: Section
5.6.1, pp. 450452.
This reading examines the ATM cell structure and explains the
function of different fields in the ATM header.
SELF-TEST 2.3
What are the disadvantages of using a 5-byte header in an ATM cell?
The next section explains VP concepts and their advantages.
Virtual path concepts

In an ATM network, end-to-end connections are established between end
stations before the traffic can start flowing. Routing of cells in the network is
performed at every switch for each arriving cell. Two levels of identifiers are
used to route cells in ATM networks: Virtual Channel Identifiers (VCI) and
Virtual Path Identifiers (VPI).
Virtual channel (VC) is a concept used to describe unidirectional transport of
ATM cells between two end stations associated by a common unique identifier
value, referred to as the VCI. Virtual path (VP) is a concept used to describe
unidirectional transport of cells belonging to virtual channels that are associated
by a common identifier value, referred to as the VPI.
An analogy of VCI and VPI is the seat number on a flight and the flight number.
For example, you are assigned to the seat 20C (VCI) on the flight UA001 (VPI),
which goes from Hong Kong to Los Angeles via Tokyo. All the passengers on
flight UA001 will get on the plane in Hong Kong and go to Tokyo. Some
passengers, however, may go through transit to another flight (a new VPI) and
40 X
get new seat numbers (a new VCI) in Tokyo, while some passengers will stay in
their seats on flight UA001 to continue their trip to Los Angeles. When the plane
arrives in Los Angeles, all passengers leave the plane (VP ends). The flight
number of the plane may change to UA311 (a new VP) and start a journey to
Boston.
VPI/VCI addresses are only meaningful to local connections within the VC or
VP. Thus there is no need for global address as there is in TCP/IP. This can
greatly reduce the size of VPI/VCI addresses. To extend our airline analogy, the
flight number and seat numbers are only meaningful to one particular airline
(United Airlines in this case).
This virtual path concept is adopted in the ATM standard. The VPI provides an
explicit path identification for a cell, while VCI provides explicit circuit
identification for a cell. Basically, a virtual path is a bundle of virtual circuits that
are switched as a unit by defining one additional layer of multiplexing on a percell basis underneath the VCI. A predefined route is provided with each virtual
path; thus it is not necessary to rewrite the routing table at call set-up. Therefore,
call-by-call processing at switching nodes is reduced, and call set-up delay is
decreased. That is, VPs are semi-permanent connections. To take full advantage
of the VP concept, each VP is allocated a fixed amount of bandwidth. To establish
a connection between two end-stations, the networks simply find a suitable path
consisting of a sequence of VPs that has sufficient bandwidth to support the
connection. In other words, the VP concept provides a logical link between two
nodes, and this creates an overlay network with logical links on top of the
physical network. Now why not re-read this paragraph and think of it in terms of
the UAL flight to Los Angeles?
In short, the VP/VC scheme gives lower node cost but at the expense of higher
link cost. This characteristic is valuable to ATM networks because large
bandwidth will be available as high capacity optical fibres become more widely
used. A transmission path may contain several virtual paths and each virtual
path may carry several virtual circuits.
The next reading examines the process of connection set-up and routing in ATM
using the VP concept.
READING 2.6b
Tanenbaum, A (1996) Computer Networks, Prentice Hall: Sections
5.6.25.6.3, pp. 452458.
41
SELF-TEST 2.4
What are the advantages of using the virtual path concept in terms of
network management?
The ATM Adaptation Layer (AAL)

The ATM adaptation layer (AAL) provides a range of alternative service classes
for the transport of the information streams generated by the various higher
protocol layers. These higher-level services include user services and control and
management functions. Associated with each service class is a different
adaptation protocol that converts the source information into streams of 48-byte
cells. Recall that an ATM cell consists of a 48-byte payload field and a 5-byte
header.
The AAL can be further divided into two sub-layers: the convergence sub-layer
(CS) and the segmentation and re-assembly sub-layer (SAR). The CS is service
dependent; it converts an information stream into packet streams of data
according to service types. The SAR performs the necessary segmentation of the
source information ready for transfer in the 48-byte cells and re-assembles the
source information from cells at the destination.
In order for ATM to support many kinds of services with different traffic
characteristics and system requirements, it is necessary to adapt the different
classes of applications to the ATM layer. This function is performed by the AAL,
which is service-dependent.
The following four types of AAL are currently recommended by ITU-T in the
series I.363.1 I.363.5.
1.
AAL type 1 adaptation for constant bit rate services;
2.
AAL type 2 adaptation for variable bit rate services;
3.
AAL type 3/4 adaptation for data services;
4.
AAL type 5 adaptation for signalling and data services.
42 X
The specific functions of each AAL are as follows.

AAL type 1 supports CBR delay sensitive applications.
AAL type 2 provides bandwidth-efficient transmission of low-rate, short and

variable packets in delay sensitive applications. It supports VBR and CBR.
AAL2 also provides for variable payload within cells and across cells.
The ITU-T has originally recommended AAL types 3 and 4 for connectionoriented and connectionless services, respectively. Since these two supported
services are almost the same, the ITU-T has combined them to form the AAL
3/4. AAL3/4 packets are used to carry computer data.
Since the AAL type 3/4 was originally proposed to support connectionoriented services as well, it has a high overhead. As a result, AAL type 5 is
recommended to offer services with less overhead and better error detection.
The ITU-T has adopted AAL type 5 for IP traffic and for signalling as well.
AAL type 5 has been shown to have a 2030% better throughput than that of
AAL type 3/4.
ATM QoS requirements

To provide different services in a single network, the network must know the
characteristics and requirements of the services. For example, loss of some
information is acceptable in voice transmission because the human ear may still
be able to recognize the sounds transmitted. However, in data applications such
as file transfers, the loss of a small amount of data may make all the data that is
transferred useless. While lost data can be retransmitted for non-real-time
applications, retransmission is not feasible for real-time applications. Depending
on the type of service, different quality of service (QoS) thresholds must therefore
be specified.
When the network accepts a connection request, the user and the network agree
on a traffic contract for the duration of the connection. With this contract, the
network guarantees the requested service demand of the connection as long as
the source traffic complies with some specified limits. Accordingly, a traffic
contract includes traffic descriptors, service requirements and the conformance
definitions. Some of the parameters adopted by ATM Forum include:
1.
Peak Cell Rate (PCR) the inverse of the minimum time between two cell
submissions to the network, i.e., a connections maximum transmission
rate;
2.
Sustainable Cell Rate (SCR) the long-term average rate of a connection;
3.
Minimum Cell Rate (MCR) the inverse of the maximum time between
two cells; that is, the minimum usable bandwidth for a connection;
43
4.
Burst Tolerance (BT) the duration in which the source is allowed to

transmit traffic at its peak rate. It defines the Maximum Burst Size (MBS) of
the source;
5.
Cell Delay Variation Tolerance (CDVT) the permissible departure from

the periodicity of the traffic.
These parameters are the traffic descriptors to specify the behaviour of the traffic,
and they are defined by the Generalized Cell Rate Algorithm (GCRA), which
controls the arrival times of cells.
There are additional parameters describing the service requirement:
1.
Cell Loss Ratio (CLR) the ratio of the number of lost cells to the total
number of cells sent by a user over the lifetime of the connection;
2.
Cell Transfer Delay (CTD) the delay experienced by a cell inside the
network including coding and packetization delay, propagation delay,
transmission and switching delay, queuing delay, and re-assembly delay,
etc.;
3.
Cell Delay Variation (CDV) the variance of the transmission delay of a

connection.
Please note that not all the QoS requirement parameters and traffic descriptors
are used to specify the service class. Different service classes may specify only
some of the above parameters.
ATM classes of service

To support different types of service with diverse QoS requirements, the ATM
Forum has defined several service classes in its traffic management
specifications, including:
1.
Constant Bit Rate (CBR);
2.
Real-time Variable Bit Rate (rt-VBR);
3.
Non-real-time Variable Bit Rate (nrt-VBR);
4.
Available Bit Rate (ABR);
5.
Unspecified Bit Rate (UBR);
6.
Guaranteed Frame Rate (GFR).
44 X
Please read Sections 2.12.3 of Traffic Management Specification Ver. 4.1 from the
ATM Forum for a detailed explanation of each service class. Pay particular
attention to Table 2.1 for the relationship between the service classes and their
corresponding traffic and QoS parameters. Some examples of different
applications for ATM service classes are also discussed in these assigned
readings.
READING 2.7
ATM Forum (March 1999) Traffic Management Specification Ver. 4.1,
Sections 2.12.3, 3.13.2, pp. 48, 12 <ftp://ftp.atmforum.com/
pub/approved-specs/af-tm-0121.000.pdf>
READING 2.8
ATM Forum (March 1999) Informative Appendix IV: Applications
Examples for ATM Service Categories, Traffic Management
Specification Ver. 4.1, and p. 95 <ftp://ftp.atmforum.com/pub/
approved-specs/af-tm-0121.000.pdf>
The very long document from the ATM Forum that the above two extracts are
taken from contains the most updated specifications for ATM traffic
management. Although the document is very comprehensive, it is too detailed
for the purpose of this course, so you should only read the sections specified
here.
READING 2.6c
Tanenbaum, A (1996) Computer Networks, Prentice Hall: Sections
5.6.45.6.5, pp. 458463.
(O
Optional) The International Engineering Consortium, Asynchronous
Transfer Mode (ATM) Fundamentals, Web ProForum Tutorials: Section
4, pp. 67 <http://www.webproforum.com/atm_fund/>
45
SELF-TEST 2.5
Give an example of an application in each service class.
Traffic management in ATM networks

An ATM network consists of switches and user equipment connected by high
speed links. An ATM switch has a number of input and output lines. When a cell
arrives, the switch reads its virtual circuit identifier and sends the cell to the
corresponding output link. Each multiplexer in the switch is equipped with a
buffer that can store cells when they occasionally arrive faster than they can be
transmitted.
When the traffic is bursty, the network can take advantage of statistical
multiplexing to improve the efficiency. Nevertheless, when the arrival rate at the
buffer approaches its service rate, the queue length grows dramatically. The node
becomes congested and the buffer starts to overflow (i.e., cells arriving to a full
buffer are discarded). Dropped cells are eventually retransmitted by an upstream
node (or by the source), causing the traffic load to increase further. As the
number of retransmissions increases, more nodes become congested and more
cells are dropped. Eventually, the network can reach a catastrophic state in which
most of the cells in the network are retransmissions. Hence, resource
management and traffic control are required to take full advantage of statistical
multiplexing.
Traffic control using reactive mechanisms (such as window flow control) has
been widely implemented in low-speed packet-switched networks. Windowbased mechanisms typically rely on end-to-end exchanges of control messages to
regulate traffic flow. However, due to large bandwidth-delay products with high
speed links, there are many cells in transit at any time in the network. With such
a reactive feedback control, when the control messages reach the traffic sources, it
will be too late and the number of lost cells is very large.
For instance, a 53-byte cell takes about 3 ms to be transmitted by a 155 Mbps link
(a standard ATM link speed) so that a delay of 30 ms corresponds to 104 cell
transmission times. Thus, the feedback from the network is usually outdated and
any action the source takes may be too late to resolve network congestion. This is
an argument for preventive mechanisms that do not rely so heavily on network
feedback. It is also important that the congestion control mechanism operates at
the speed of communication link. For this reason, computation-intensive control
46 X
schemes are less desirable than simple schemes that can be easily implemented in
high speed hardware. Therefore, a preventive control method has been proposed
to prevent congestion by taking appropriate action before the congestion actually
occurs.
Nevertheless, it is generally agreed that preventive control techniques are not
sufficient to eliminate congestion problems in ATM networks, and that when
congestion happens, it is necessary to react to the congested state. In addition,
preventive controls may be inefficient because bandwidth may be over-allocated.
Reactive control techniques are used to initiate recovery from a congested state
so that the network will not be stuck with long-term congestion.
Accordingly, the congestion control schemes in ATM can be further classified
into different layers according to different time scales. This multilevel congestion
evaluation and control is motivated by the fact that communication terminals
often have traffic states characterized by these levels. Thus, to improve network
efficiency, traffic control should be exercised at these levels.
The first of the following two readings presents an overview of the traffic
management issues and possible solutions to support multimedia over an ATM
network. You will find that different levels of management mechanisms are used
to control the traffic. The next reading, which is optional, explains the different
levels of management and control in ATM networks.
READING 2.9
Zheng, B and Atiquzzaman, M (1999) Traffic management of
multimedia over ATM networks, IEEE Communication Magazine,
37(1) (Jan.): 3338.
(Optional)
The
International
Engineering
Consortium,
Asynchronous Transfer Mode (ATM) Fundamentals, Web
ProForum
Tutorials,
Section
9,
pp.
1415
<http://
www.webproforum.com/atm_fund/>
ACTIVITY 2.2
Please briefly describe three different traffic management strategies
in ATM networks.
47
In the previous discussion, we suggested that congestion prevention policies are

required in high speed networks. Two common preventive control mechanisms
are call admission control and traffic shaping.
Call admission control

In ATM networks, the bandwidth of VC is not clearly defined since all
information is segmented into cells and the required number of cells is generated
and conveyed through the networks. As the number of VCs increases in a VP,
more cells are in the network and the chance of congestion increases. Then the
QoS may deteriorate, e.g. the cell loss ratio increases and cell delay increases.
Thus it is impossible to accept an unlimited number of VCs while guaranteeing
the QoS.
Call admission control (CAC) is defined as the set of actions taken by the
network at the call set-up phase (or during the call re-negotiation phase) to
determine whether a connection can be accepted or rejected. A call is accepted if
the network has sufficient resources to provide the QoS requirements of this
connection without affecting the QoS provided to existing connections.
Consequently, there are two major functions of the CAC mechanism:
1.
Bandwidth allocation determines the amount of bandwidth required by

a new connection.
2.
Performance monitoring ensures that the QoS required by existing

connections is not affected when multiplexed together with this new
connection.
Traffic shaping
One major advantage of ATM is the statistical multiplexing gain of bursty traffic.
Now, suppose we have a source sending 100 Mbps for 1 second and remaining
silent for 99 seconds. Thus, the average rate of the source is only 1 Mbps over a
period of 100 seconds. Since 100 Mbits of information can be dumped into the
network during the 1 second period, this highly bursty traffic source can
jeopardize the whole network. The situation is similar to sending thousands of
email bombs to an email server at the same time. As a result, a control
mechanism is introduced to force the traffic to be transmitted at a more
predictable rate. This preventive mechanism is known as traffic shaping.
Traffic shaping is to regulate the average transmission rate of data by smoothing
out bursty traffic. For instance, the smoothed traffic will only transmit 10 Mbps
over a period of 10 seconds, which can be easily handled by the networks. One
traffic shaping algorithm commonly used in ATM is the leaky bucket. In the
48 X
following reading, you will learn the basic concepts related to the leaky bucket
and token bucket algorithms.
READING 2.10
Tanenbaum, A (1996) Computer Networks, Prentice Hall: Section
5.3.3, pp. 379384.
SELF-CHECK 2.6
Please briefly describe two major differences between the leaky
bucket and the token bucket.
Integration of IP and ATM

ATM is a new technology that can be used to support B-ISDN. ATMs major
advantages include its scalability of bandwidth and its capability of supporting
multi-type traffic with a QoS guarantee. In principle, therefore, ATM could
function as a universal network. However, the Internet is widely accepted as the
universal communication solution today. It is therefore unlikely that ATM will
replace all the existing networks with the dominance of IP. This has led to a hot
debate between IP and ATM in the past few years.
The growing demands for QoS support on the Internet have changed the
situation. Instead, the industry has taken a more realistic approach: integrating IP
and ATM to get the speed of ATM and the flexibility of IP. This is the basic
concept of IP over ATM, which is discussed in the first of the following two
readings. You can then take a look at Dahods paper for an overview of the issues
of IP v. ATM.
READING 2.11
Reading 2.11: White, P (1998) ATM switching and IP routing
integration: the next stage in Internet solution? IEEE
Communications Magazine, 36(4) (April): 7983.
49
READING 2.12
Reading 2.12: Dahod, A (1999) Viewpoint: ATM v. Internet Protocol,
IEEE Spectrum, 36(1) (Jan.): 3031 <http://www.spectrum.ieee.org/
spectrum/jan99/features/commsb1.html>
ACTIVITY 2.3
1.
What are the advantages of IP over ATM?
2.
What is LAN emulation?
3.
Please identify two non-classical approaches to support IP over

ATM.
ATM v. Gigabit Ethernet

Earlier in the topic it was suggested that both ATM and Gigabit Ethernet could
offer a bandwidth of 1 Gbps. So now that youve learned something about both
of these technologies, how does Gigabit Ethernet compare to ATM?
Well, we can say that Gigabit Ethernet and ATM are complementary
technologies. Ethernet is the most popular and dominant LAN technology. The
introduction of Gigabit Ethernet is likely to simply extend this dominance.
Gigabit Ethernets backward compatibility with the existing 802.3 Ethernet is
likely to be the key to its success. We shall see many more companies using
Gigabit Ethernet as the backbone network.
On the other hand, ATM, as a technology that supports B-ISDN, has its own
advantages. ATM is ideal for use in wide area network (WAN) connections
where the need for support of integrated services and real-time applications is
especially strong. For instance, ATM is widely deployed as the high speed WAN
to interconnect cities in the USA. The ability to provide QoS guarantees is
another crucial feature missing in traditional Ethernet networks. ATM can also be
used within LANs where integration to an ATM WAN is important.
You should now read the following articles which address the question of ATM
v. Gigabit Ethernet.
50 X
READING 2.13
Rauch,
(1999) Viewpoint: ATM vs. Gigabit Ethernet,

IEEE Spectrum, 36(1) (Jan.): 3233 <http://www.spectrum.ieee.org/
spectrum/jan99/ features/commsb2.html>
Competing technologies IP over SONET

So far, we have suggested that ATM is an ideal solution for future broadband
service. The integration of IP with ATM is a promising evolutionary
development for the next generation of the Internet. However, there are also
disadvantages with using ATM as a transport technology. Recall that each 53
byte ATM cell has a 5 byte head; this means ATM has a 10% (= 5/53) overhead.
In other words, you can only have a maximum 90% efficiency rate with ATM. Is
it possible to improve this efficiency? Well, the answer is yes.
At present, most network structures are as follows: IP packets transport on top of
ATM and ATM in turn run over SONET. If we remove the ATM layer completely
and run IP directly over SONET, we can eliminate the 10% loss due to ATM
header overhead. This is the basic concept of IP over SONET.
In the next reading, an overview of IP over SONET technology is provided. This
reading gives you another high speed backbone solution. You may wonder:
should we use ATM or not? Well, its hard to say. Similar to many emerging
technologies in the past, a sound technology does not mean that it is marketable.
Thus, only time can tell which technology will survive.
READING 2.14
Manchester, J et al. (1998) IP over SONET, IEEE Communications
Magazine, 36(5) (May): 136142.
ATM for residential broadband

ATM was first designed to operate over optical fibre as a backbone network.
With increasing demand for multimedia applications, home users are requiring
more bandwidth. This motivates the extension of broadband ATM service to
residential users.
51
New broadband-access copper technologies such as Asynchronous Digital

Subscriber Lines (ADSL) have been introduced, which allows maximum 8 Mbps
downlink and 640 kbps uplink transmission using ordinary telephone lines.
Running ATM on top of ADSL networks (ATM over ADSL), IMS can provide
high speed connection to residential users. The details of ADSL will be discussed
in other topic.
The following article describes how IP/ATM integrated services can be offered
over broadband access copper technologies (xDSL). Please go through this article
quickly; your goal should be to simply gain a basic grasp of xDSL concepts. You
will encounter more detailed information regarding xDSL in other topic.
READING 2.15
Azcorra, A et al. (1999) IP/ATM integrated services over broadband
access copper technologies, IEEE Communications Magazine, 37(5)
(May): 9096.
(Optional) Further information

The ATM Forum is the main organization that is pushing the advancement of
ATM. The following article describes some of the key achievements of the ATM
Forum, and should help you to better understand the development of the ATM
standard so far.
You are also encouraged to visit the Interoperability Lab website. Their
homepages contain several tutorials on new technologies in networking.
Interested students can visit the site to get more detailed information. In
addition, this site has links to other useful websites.
Readings (optional)
Dobrowski, G (1998) The ATM Forum: developing implementation agreements,
IEEE Communication Magazine, 36(9) (Sept): 121125.
Tutorials and Resources, University of New Hampshire, Interoperability Lab

<http://www.iol.unh.edu/training/index.html>
52 X
This topic discussed several high speed networks. We started with Gigabit
Ethernet, which is the extension of the popular 802.3 Ethernet network. Its
backward compatibility with 802.3 Ethernet is likely to ensure the quick
acceptance of Gigabit Ethernet in the LAN market.
We then focused our study on a new technology ATM, which is the
supporting technology for B-ISDN. ATM is a connection-oriented, packetswitching technique that uses short fixed-size packets called cells to transfer
information. The layered B-ISDN model for ATM was then briefly described, as
were the functions of different fields in the ATM header and the various types of
AAL to adapt the higher-layer services to services supported by the ATM layer.
ATM can support multi-type traffic with the QoS guarantee that is essential for
B-ISDN. Different traffic classes can be supported in ATM networks, and they
were specified in terms of traffic parameters. Traffic management is essential to
high speed networking. Various control mechanisms to support multimedia were
briefly discussed. We have also briefly introduced the basic concepts of call
admission control and traffic shaping.
The purpose of a computer network is interconnecting different nodes. We
described several approaches to support IP over ATM. We made a simple
comparison between Gigabit Ethernet and the ATM network. Then, we described
a competing technology IP over SONET.
Finally, we discussed the issue of providing ATM service to home users with
new xDSL technology. More information on the residential broadband services
will be described in other topic.
53
Asynchronous Transfer
Mode (ATM)
A
connection-oriented,
packet-switching
technique that uses short fixed-size packets called
cells.
ATM Adaptation Layer

(AAL)
The AAL converts the higher layer

information stream into a stream of 48-byte data
cells.
Bandwidth delay product

maximum
The product of bandwidth and delay. In the (BDP)

data link layer, BDP represents theamount of
allowed unacknowledged data inside a network.
Broadband Integrated
Service Digital Network
(B-ISDN)
A single high speed digital network to

support multi-type traffic such as voice,
video, image and data.
Call admission control
The set of actions taken by the network at the call

set-up phase (or during the call re-negotiation
phase) to determine whether a connection can be
accepted or rejected.
Gigabit Ethernet
IEEE 802.3z 1 Gbps version of the 802.3 Ethernet
IP-over-ATM
Transport of IP packets over ATM networks.
Multiplexing gain
The ratio of total input capacity to total output

capacity.
Quality of Service (QoS)
The service level required by an application,

generally measured in terms of delays, bandwidth
and packet loss.
Statistical multiplexing
The multiplexing technique that allows several

variable-bit-rate (VBR) connections to share a link
with a capacity less than the sum of their peak bit
rate requirements.
Traffic shaping
The mechanism to regulate the average rate of

data transmission.
Virtual channel
A concept used to describe unidirectional

transport of ATM cells between two end stations
associated by a common unique identifier value,
VCI.
54 X
Virtual path
A concept used to describe unidirectional

transport of cells belonging to virtual channels
that are associated by a common identifier value,
VPI.
Wireless ATM
The extension of ATM technology in wireless

communication.
xDSL
Different
digital
technologies.
subscriber
lines
across
SOLUTIONS TO SELF-TEST QUESTIONS

Self-test 2.1
Advantages of statistical multiplexing over time-division multiplexing:
When the traffic is bursty, statistical multiplexing is more bandwidthefficient. The multiplexing gain of statistical multiplexing can be much larger
than that of time-division multiplexing.
Disadvantages of statistical multiplexing over time-division multiplexing:

It is more complicated to implement the multiplexer and demultiplexer.
There is additional overhead to identify the source.
When the traffic is smooth (e.g. constant bit rate), time-division multiplexing
can be more bandwidth efficient.
Self-test 2.2
Advantages of ATM:
High performance via hardware switching the small header and fixed
packet size reduce the processing delay.
Dynamic bandwidth for bursty traffic statistical multiplexing of bursty

traffic reduces the required bandwidth.
Class-of service support for multimedia supports multiple service classes

with different QoS.
Scalability in speed and network size the cell switching technique is

flexible enough to allow changes in speed and network size.
55
Common LAN/WAN architecture the same ATM network architecture

can be used in both LAN and WAN environments.
Opportunities for simplification the use of VP/VC connections simplifies

the traffic management, security and connection set-up.
International standards vendors can produce standardized products

according to ITU-Ts specifications.
Self-test 2.3
Disadvantages for using 5-byte header in an ATM cell:
Limited functions can be implemented in ATM header; e.g. no error

protection or flow control on a link-by-link basis.
Large overhead because of the space in each cell used for ATM header. Thus
the maximum efficiency of bandwidth is only around 90%.
Self-test 2.4
Advantages of VP concept:
Using the VP concept, network resources are semi-permanently allocated.

This allows an efficient and simple management of available network
resources.
For instance, if a company wants 10 Mbps bandwidth, you just set up a VP with
10 Mbps bandwidth to this company. This is similar to hiring a circuit.
To admit a call, we only need to find a suitable VP with sufficient resources to

guarantee QoS requirements. This simplifies call admission and call routing.
If congestion or breakdown occurs, all the VC within a VP can be redirected

to another VP connection by simply changing the VPI values.
Self-test 2.5
CBR
RT-VBR
NRT-VBR
ABR
UBR
Telephone
traffic, CBR
video
Interactive
compressed
video
Multimedia
email
File transfer
TCP/IP traffic

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Topic X Broadband

Describe the main features of Gigabit Ethernet.

List and describe the advantages of using Gigabit Ethernet.

Discuss the main features and advantages of ATM.

Explain the concept of statistical multiplexing and multiplexing

Outline the layered implementation of Broadband Integrated

Describe the service classes supported by ATM and explain the

Discuss how ATM can support IP.

Describe the concept of IP over SONET.

TOPIC 2 BROADBAND COMMUNICATIONS (PART I)

Ethernet. Gigabit Ethernet has the advantage of simple backward compatibility

TOPIC 2 BROADBAND COMMUNICATIONS (PART I) W

High speed network

Youll be introduced to two currently-emerging high speed networks in this

TOPIC 2 BROADBAND COMMUNICATIONS (PART I)

HIGH SPEED BACKBONE NETWORKS

TOPIC 2 BROADBAND COMMUNICATIONS (PART I) W

GIGABIT ETHERNET (IEEE 802.3Z)

What is Gigabit Ethernet?

TOPIC 2 BROADBAND COMMUNICATIONS (PART I)

TOPIC 2 BROADBAND COMMUNICATIONS (PART I) W

1000BASE-T: Gigabit Ethernet Over Category 5 Copper Cabling, 3Com

TOPIC 2 BROADBAND COMMUNICATIONS (PART I)

What are the main advantages of using Gigabit Ethernet?

Does Gigabit Ethernet follow the CSMA/CD protocol? What

What are the transmission media used in Gigabit Ethernet?

How would you rate the performance of Gigabit Ethernet in

After the successful introduction of Gigabit Ethernet, the industry is pushing a

Delay: the roundtrip time for transmitting information between the

Bandwidth: the number of bits transmitted per second.

TOPIC 2 BROADBAND COMMUNICATIONS (PART I) W

The bandwidth delay product (B

TOPIC 2 BROADBAND COMMUNICATIONS (PART I)

ASYNCHRONOUS TRANSFER MODE (ATM)

TOPIC 2 BROADBAND COMMUNICATIONS (PART I) W

In addition, ATM is a connection-oriented technique in which end-to-end paths

The ups and downs of ATM

Many implementation problems, such as buffer dimensioning and

The high cost of ATM desktop interfaces, when compared to competing

Complicated internetworking with existing LANs turned away potential

TOPIC 2 BROADBAND COMMUNICATIONS (PART I)

Although ATM lost its position on the battlefield in LAN environments, it

Virtual circuit switching

TOPIC 2 BROADBAND COMMUNICATIONS (PART I) W

Time division multiplexing v. statistical multiplexing

TOPIC 2 BROADBAND COMMUNICATIONS (PART I)

Figure 2.1(a): Time slots are unused in time division multiplexing

Statistical multiplexing gain

TOPIC 2 BROADBAND COMMUNICATIONS (PART I) W

Figure 2.2: Statistical multiplexing

TOPIC 2 BROADBAND COMMUNICATIONS (PART I)

The layered B-ISDN model for ATM

TOPIC 2 BROADBAND COMMUNICATIONS (PART I) W

Figure 2.3: The B-ISDN ATM protocol reference model

This model contains four planes:

a user plane to transport user information;

a control plane mainly containing signalling information;

a management plane to maintain the network and perform operational

plane management to manage different planes.

TOPIC 2 BROADBAND COMMUNICATIONS (PART I)

ATM header structure

Figure 2.4: ATM header structure at the UNI

The component fields in the header and their functions are:

Generic Flow Control (GFC) implements the flow control mechanism on