ANALYSIS OF MULTICAST ATM SWITCHING-NETWORKS USING CRWR SCHEME

A (large) multicast ATM switch with external structure of output queue ing and internal structure of buffered MINs (multistage interconnectio n networks) is considered in the paper, where the buffered MIN (also c alled switching network) is composed of switching elements with shared buffer output queueing. The cell replication while routing (CRWR) sch eme is used in the switch to implement multicast function. In this pap er, we study the performance of the switch with multicast traffic, mai nly via computer simulations. The multicast traffic can be random and bursty. We found that compared to unicast traffic, multicast traffic w ith truncated geometric distribution of cell fanouts has only a slight ly worse impact on the performance of switching elements in isolation or in the last stage of the switching network. The multicast traffic h as no worse effect on the switch output buffer behavior and cell delay in the switching network. Moreover, using multiple MINs in parallel c an substantially improve the switching network performance for highly bursty traffic. Some analytical approximations are given which could b e useful in the dimensioning of switching networks. (C) 1998 Elsevier Science B.V.