The fast packet ring switch: a high-performance efficient architecture with multicast capability

A ring-based architecture for the packet switching of integrated traffic is presented. The architecture is nonblocking and has been designed to use the limited bandwidth of the ring interconnect most efficiently. The transmit buffers have been structured to achieve selective queuing of packets. Thus service priorities may be implemented to fairly balance the network delays among the different classes of traffic. Moreover, the current architecture has provided for the cut-through switching of packets. Quasi-circuit switching through selected ports can then be achieved with a peak bit-rate bandwidth allocation strategy. Thus hybrid integrated packet and circuit switching is made possible