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April 14, 2008

Ring vs Mesh topology in Carrier Ethernet networks

Network architects have debated over the best way to interconnect network elements. The ring camp believes that the best way to recover from a failure is to have a simple topology where all nodes have a similar access to the bandwidth. The mesh camp believes that the most scalable and flexible way to interconnect network elements is in meshes.

Service Providers are familiar with SONET rings and they expect Ethernet based rings in Carrier Ethernet networks to perform similarly. However, Ethernet rings are expected to behave like Ethernet networks with oversubscription, redundant access, node protection, link aggregation and so on. Thus, Ethernet ring requirements can be more complicated than SONET ring requirements.

Do we have to mandate a ring topology in Carrier Ethernet networks?

It will be very attractive if a protocol can support both ring and mesh topologies in Carrier Ethernet networks.

Posted by Rajiv Kapoor on April 14, 2008 06:53 AM