Reliability performances of optical ATM switches based on different routing and buffering schemes

Reliability performances of seven equal-capacity optical asynchronous trans fer mode switches based on different routing and buffering schemes are comp ared. Calculations are based on available reliability data for commercial c omponents as well as expected life lengths for new components and systems. In general, for switching systems, average downtime is required to be held below 3 min/year. However, our results indicate that the average downtime f or the proposed configurations is much longer than requested, over ten time s longer for the best case and over 1500 times longer for the worst case. T herefore, the multiplane structures (i.e., multiplying of the entire system s) have to be provided for the switching systems investigated here in order to satisfy reliability requirements.