Towards a high speed MAN architecture

Many applications could be implemented if very high speed communications systems were available. Although high-bandwidth network infrastructures exist today, the end-to-end throughput of actual communications systems is far less than what the physical links can handle. An attempt is made to identify the bottlenecks in current network architectures, and a framework is outlined for the design of an architecture and protocol suite for high-speed metropolitan area networks (MANs). The status of MAN architectural design is examined, and the actual performance limitations that are due to current communications systems architectures are addressed.<>