Department of Information & Communications Technology

HKIVE (TY)
Broadband Networks Tutorial #8
1.

i)

SONET is optimized for TDM voice. State the deficiency of SONET when used for
data services
State two deficiencies of WDM when used to support multi-services networks.
State two deficiencies with Gigabit Ethernets (GE) or 10 GE when apply to carrier
networks.
POS, ATM and Frame Relay all suffer from the n-square scaling dilemma in meshtype point-to-point connections.
Assume 3 routers with POS interfaces are fully connected together via the ADM of a
SONET ring, see figure 1.1.
a)
How many POS interfaces are there in each router?
How many POS interfaces are there in each ADM?
What is the total number of POS interfaces installed in these 3 routers OR 3
ADMs?
b)
If one more router, i.e. a 4th router, is added to the network using POS via
another ADM (the 4th ADM), how many POS interfaces are there in each
router and in each ADM?
What is the total number of POS interfaces installed in these 4 routers OR
these 4 ADMs?
c)
What conclusion can you draw from the calculations in a) and b)?
d)
Assume:
the SONET ring in figure 1.1 is unidirectional with one ring-set
reserved for protection
the line rate of each POS connection is 155.52 Mbps (i.e. OC-3
rate)
What is the bandwidth requirement in Mbps for this SONET ring with 5
ADMs?
With reference to table 1.1 (page 1-21) in notes, which OC level should be
selected to build a SONET ring such that it can accommodate these 5 ADMs
and the respective PoS interfaces?

ii)
iii)
iv)

Router

Router
ADM
Connections
Using POS
Interfaces

ADM

SONET

.
.
Connections
Using POS
Interfaces

ADM
Connections
Using POS
Interfaces

Figure 1.1
2.

i)
ii)
iii)

How does Resilient Packet Ring (RPR) eliminate the scaling problem in POS, ATM
and Frame Relay as discussed in question 1 above?
List the 7 objectives/features of RPR.
a)
RPR uses a dual counter ring topology.
Which ring is used to carry data (i.e. user) traffic?
Which ring is used to carry the corresponding control traffic?
b)
Briefly describer how a RPR node discovers the topology after it is being
inserted into the network?

iv)
v)
vi)

vii)

viii)

a)

Draw a block diagram to show the functions supported by the RPR MAC
layer.
b)
How do RPR nodes support latency and delay sensitive services?
Draw a diagram to illustrate least cost traffic engineering and spatial re-use.
a)
Wrapping is one of the two RPR protection mechanisms.
State the other RPR protection mechanism.
b)
With the help of a diagram, explain how the wrapping protection
mechanism works.
c)
State one advantage of the wrapping protection mechanism over the other
protection mechanism.
d)
State one disadvantage of the wrapping protection mechanism when
compared with the other protection mechanism.
a)
State two types of physical layer that are currently available in todays widearea and local area networks to carry RPR packets.
b)
Propose one method to apply RPR in metro networks. Draw a diagram if
necessary.
In your opinion, are RPR and MPLS competing with each other or are they
complementing each other? Explain.