TECHNOLOGY

Bandwidth Pooling

The architectural structure of the HSX 6000 has moved away from a traditional 1:1 fixed mapping of traffic between the physical interface modules and the system’s processing modules. Historically, fixed mapping tends to strand payloads and imposes restrictive engineering constraints on module placement within the chassis. In the HSX 6000, the TDM1 switch fabric of the SFM provides flexible connectivity between any PHM and any USM — guaranteeing that any number of PHMs can be efficiently mapped to a processing engine — up to the fully rated capacity of 2.5 Gbps per USM.

Optimal Switching Capacity

The “bandwidth pooling” flexibility also maximizes the node’s switching capacity, which ensures that bandwidth on a USM module will not be stranded. For configurations requiring high fan-in of a very large number of low-speed interfaces (e.g. Frame Relay DS0 and NXDS0), bandwidth pooling enables a small number of USMs to service all of the interfaces in a fully populated switch.

Bandwidth pooling also provides service and module protection. This architectural feature enables 1:1 and 1:N protection of USMs as well as 1+1 APS interface protection on the half-height network side PHMs, without reducing the effective capacity of the switch.