Performance comparison between ATM LAN emulation, classical IP over ATM, and native ATM in a multi-platform multi-operating system environment

The question of how best to integrate asynchronous transfer mode (ATM) technology into the local area network (LAN) infrastructure and how well ATM will interoperate with existing LAN technologies is critical to the success of the ATM. We present the results of a study which deals with both the implementation issues and a performance comparison between three key mechanisms available for implementing ATM in the LAN environment today. The three mechanisms compared are the LAN emulation (LANE), classical IP over ATM (CLIP), and native ATM (NATM). The results of our performance comparison are based on measurements taken on a fully operational multi-switch ATM infrastructure capable of supporting multiple CLIP, LANE, and native ATM sub-nets. Our performance comparisons characterize both high volume data transfer capabilities and transaction processing (i.e., query and response) capabilities of various computing platforms while interconnected via LANE, CLIP, and native ATM. Our performance results indicate that the highest throughputs are achieved under native ATM and classical IP, followed by LAN emulation, respectively.