A performance analysis of a parallel communications scheme for ATM networks

A parallel communications scheme for broadband networks was proposed previously. In this scheme, the traffic of a connection is split into m substreams, which are then coded into k/spl ges/m streams for delivery over k separate subchannels. This paper is an attempt toward a more careful study of the scheme. In particular, the average queueing length and mean delay time at a switch are derived analytically using a general bulk arrival source model taking into account the reduction of traffic burstiness (due to traffic splitting) and increase of traffic load (due to coding). The cell-loss probability with finite buffer are investigated by means of simulation. The relative performance of the scheme with no splitting, splitting without coding, splitting with coding at the switch are described in detail.