ASYNCHRONOUS TRANSFER MODE (ATM)

CALLUENG, CHRIS ANTHONY O.

ENCISO, RAPHAEL OLIVER B.

WHAT IS ATM?
ATM is a cell-switching and multiplexing technology that combines the benefits of circuit switching (guaranteed capacity and constant transmission delay) with those of packet switching (flexibility and efficiency for intermittent traffic) CISCO.

WHAT IS ATM?
It is a high speed, connection oriented switching and multiplexing technology capable of transmitting voice, video and data on both LAN and WAN ATM was developed to meet the needs of Broadband-Integrated Service Digital Network

B-ISDN
Broadband-Integrated Service Digital Network (B-ISDN) A standard for transmitting voice, video and data at the same time over fiber optic telephone lines.

CHARACTERISTICS OF ATM
No error protection or flow control on a link-by-link basis. ATM operates in a connection-oriented mode. The header functionality is reduced. The information field length is relatively small and fixed. All data types are the same

FEATURES AND BENEFITS OF ATM

Convergence of Voice , Video and Data on one network High speed switching at hardware level Bandwidth on demand Predefined and guaranteed QoS and CoS Superior Management features Scalability in network size and speed Ease of integration with other technologies

CELL AND CELL RELAY

A Cell is a formatted packet that uses a fixed length data unit Cell relay is the process of moving these cells through switching elements Fixed size cells can be switched at a very high speed and add predictability to data transmissions Cell tax overhead imposed by ATM cells which can cut into amount of data that can be transferred

ATM OPERATIONS CONCEPTS

A virtual or logical connection is established ATM forms a packet of fixed length 53 octets ( 5 octet header and 48 octet information field ) Cells are placed in a queue, on reaching ATM switch Cells are then multiplexed asynchronously with other cells for transmission Switch adapts the incoming bit rate to match the transmit channel bit rate Switch inserts dummy cells to meet the aggregate bit stream rate of 155.52 Mbps

ATM CELL
ATM carries information based on fixed length cells Compare this to the other packet switching technologies such as Frame Relay etc. where each packet may be of a different length The length of each cell is 53 Bytes First 5 bytes are used as the cell header Next 48 bytes are used as the payload carrying the data Cell Structure:
5 Bytes 48 Bytes

Header

Payload (Data)

ATM CELL HEADER STRUCTURE

ATM CELL STRUCTURE

Generic Flow Control (GFC) 4 bits in UNI; 0 in NNI Provides local functions, such as identifying multiple stations that share a single ATM interface. Used to control congestion on the user interface. Virtual Path Identifier (VPI) 8 bits in UNI; 12 on NNI Used in combination with the VCI, it identifies the next destination of a cell as it passes through a series of ATM switches on the way to its destination. Used to distinguish VPs between users and in between users and networks. Virtual Channel Identifier (VCI) 16 bits in UNI; 16 on NNI is the second half of the two-part connection identifier carried in the ATM header. Payload Type Identifier (PTI) 3 bits indicates the type of information carried in the 48-byte data portion of the ATM cell.

ATM CELL STRUCTURE (CONTD)

Cell Loss Priority (CLP) 1 bit Indicates if a cell should be dropped or not during a congestion (1 = droppable, 0 = non-droppable). Header Error Control (HEC) 8 bits Used to provide forward error correction. Information is sent in the cell that can be used to fix errors. It first calculates a checksum on the first 4 bytes of the header. If there is a single bit error, HEC can correct it and preserve the cell rather than discard it. Provides error control for single-bit error and error detection for multiple-bit errors in the cell error. Payload 48 bytes or octets User information

FIXED LENGTH CELL ADVANTAGE

Delay or latency is significantly reduced ATM is therefore suited for voice and video transmission Fixed length cells make it easier to switch data across multiple networks ATM networks are built based on switches and not routers Fixed length cell is similar to container based road transportation Some parallels can be drawn with respect to the advantage of fixed length transportation based on the benefits of container transportation

ATM VIRTUAL CIRCUIT TERMINOLOGIES

Virtual Channel (VC) provides a fixed pathway or route between 2 points. Setup across an ATM network whenever data transfer begins. Virtual Path (VP) groups of VCs used to tell a switch how to forward an ATM cell through an ATM network Virtual Path Identifier (VPI) in the ATM header used to identify route established in the ATM Switch Virtual Channel Identifier (VCI) - in the ATM header used to identify a channel within a VP

ATM VIRTUAL CIRCUIT TERMINOLOGIES (CONTD)

Transmission path physical media transporting the cells Virtual Channel Connection (VCC) connection from source end user VCI to destination user VCI Virtual path Connection (VPC) connection from source end user VPI to the destination end user VPI Operation : Cell is received across a link on a known VPI or VCI value - their values are remapped as necessary as all VCIs and VPIs are only significant to the local link

Constant Bit Rate Variable Bit Rate Available Bit Rate Unspecified Bit Rate Guaranteed Frame Rate

ATM SERVICE CATEGORIES

Service Category Constant Bit Rate (CBR) Description Specifies a fixed bit rate so that data can be sent in a steady stream. It provides service for voice and video traffic. Provides a specified throughput capacity; however, unlike CBR, data is not sent in a steady stream. Commonly used for voice and video conferencing.

Variable Bit Rate (VBR)

Unspecified Bit Rate (UBR)

Does not guarantee any throughput levels. Primarily used for file transfers that can tolerate delays.
Provides a guaranteed minimum capacity. Also allows data to be burst at higher capacities when the network is free. Allows users to send at any rate up to the peak cell rate while the network is only committed to send at the minimum cell rate.

Available Bit Rate (ABR)

Guaranteed Frame Rate (GFR)

CONSTANT BIT RATE (CBR)

Highest grade service (Grade A) A constant bandwidth is available for the virtual channel

Suitable for voice-over-IP (Transfer fixed rate uncompressed video), and other traffic that requires steady, guaranteed throughput

VARIABLE BIT RATE (VBR)

Second in the level of service (Grade B) It is divide into to categories Variable Bit Rate Non-Real Time (VBR-NRT) Variable Bit Rate Real Time (VBR-RT)

VARIABLE BIT RATE NON-REAL TIME (VBR-NRT)

Provides bandwidth only as needed. Traffic that is not very sensitive to cell-delay or latency is handled by this service An example use would be to send multimedia e-mail

VARIABLE BIT RATE REAL TIME (VBR-RT)

Provides bandwidth only as needed same as VBR-NRT. Designed for applications where cell-delay or latency cannot be accommodated. Applications: Voice with speech activity detection (Telephony) Compressed interactive video (Video Conferencing)

AVAILABLE BIT RATE (ABR)

Third in the level of service (Grade C) Bandwidth is adjusted based on the amount of traffic in the network Suitable for data traffic such as file transfer and Email that are basically not time sensitive

UNSPECIFIED BIT RATE (UBR)

Fourth in the level of service (Grade D) Does not offer any fixed values for the traffic parameters

1. ATM Adaptation Layer (AAL) Convergence Sublayer (CS) Segmentation and Reassembly Sublayer (SAR) 2. ATM Layer 3. Physical Layer Transmission Convergence Sublayer Physical Medium Sublayer

ATM REFERENCE MODEL

The ATM reference model constructed as 3 planes which span all the layers : Control generates and manages the signaling requests User manages the transfer of data Management contains 2 parts: Layer management : manages layer specific functions Plane management : manages and co ordinates functions related to the whole system

ATM ADAPTATION LAYER (AAL)

Has 2 sublayers: Convergence Sublayer ( CS ) Determines the Class of service (CoS) for the incoming traffic Provides a specific AAL service at an AAL network service access point (NSAP) Segmentation and Reassembly Sublayer (SAR) Segments higher level user data into 48 byte cells plus necessary overhead at the sending node and reassembles cells at the receiving node

AAL TYPES AND COS

Depending on data type, the AAL protocol provides 5 AAL types to accommodate a particular service class AAL 5 is the most popular AAL type For IP, LAN frames , signaling messages, frame relay , video

ATM LAYER
Performs the framing , multiplexing / demultiplexing of cells and also does the switching Generates cell headers on transmitting node based on information from higher layers Generic flow control VCI /VPI translation Extracts cell headers on a receiving node and passes cell payload to higher layers

PHYSICAL LAYER
Transports ATM cells on a communications channel and defines mechanical specifications ( connectors etc.) 2 sublayers: Transmission Convergence Sublayer Maps cells into the physical layer frame format on transmit and delineates ATM cells in the received bit stream Generates HEC on transmit Generates idle cells for cell rate decoupling or speed matching Physical medium Sublayer Medium dependent function like bit transfer, bit alignment