Authors

Massoud R Hashemi, Alberto Leon-Garcia

Publication date

1996/11/4

Conference

Broadband Access Systems

Volume

2917

Pages

398-409

Publisher

SPIE

Description

VBR traffics with their bursty nature are still troublesome for ATM networks. The problem can be dealt with in call admission and bandwidth allocation stages and later, when the connection is established, by appropriate flow control schemes and buffer allocation mechanisms. Accommodating the large bursts in extra buffers at the inputs of switch fabric, during the overflow periods in the internal buffers, can be part of the solution given to this problem. Adding the input buffers is more preferable than expanding the internal memory because the input buffers are less expensive and can be used in bulk, while the internal buffers are more complex and expensive and not easily expandable. In this paper we consider a general model for switches with input buffers which consists of three parts: input buffer, I/O flow controller, and output (internal) buffer. In this way we isolate the switching mechanism and the back-pressure …