Performance of ATM available bit rate for bursty TCP sources and interfering traffic

The available bit rate (ABR) service dynamically utilizes free bandwidth in ATM networks for data traffic. ABR enables data sources to efficiently utilize network resources without adversely affecting the performance of guaranteed traffic such as for video. However, the majority of research to date on the performance of ABR schemes has ignored the effects of guaranteed traffic. The vast majority of research has also only utilized persistent sources although real data traffic, such as Internet traffic, is bursty. This paper presents a simulation study of bursty Internet TCP traffic over ATM with bursty interfering traffic streams. Two major ABR schemes, rate based ABR with explicit rate (ER) control and the credit based quantum flow control (QFC), are compared. The results indicate that performance with QFC is significantly better than with ER control.