BANYAN MULTIPATH SELF-ROUTING ATM SWITCHES WITH SHARED BUFFER TYPE SWITCH ELEMENTS

We propose a large-scale asynchronous transfer mode (ATM) switch architecture in which a banyan multipath self-routing network is combined advantageously with a shared buffer type switch element. The proposed banyan space-division concept yields a simple architecture having the potential to accommodate easily the growth of switch size. Since the interconnection network between switch modules or between switch elements has a twofold banyan architecture, expansion in crosspoints or interconnections with the increase of switch size can be lessened. The multipath self-routing concept makes the switch performance better and leads to an efficient realization of a switch element on a single chip as the fundamental building block of a large-size switch. We analyze the required capacity for queuing buffers in the switching network. The multipath approach inevitably creates information sequence disturbances. Therefore, we also analyze the out-of-sequence phenomenon of a banyan multipath switching system, To satisfy the sequence integrity requirement for ATM, a simple approach is proposed for the multipath switch by using a spacing controller, In addition, we quantify the improvement of out-of-sequence performance under the spacing controller scheme.