Chapter-4 Overview

• Switching
– Circuit Switching
– Packet Switching
• PSTN
• Local loop technologies

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 Chapter 4
(Switching Techniques, PSTN, Local loop technologies)

OBJECTIVES LEARNING OUTCOMES (LO)

1- Understand the data 1- Understand and distinguish between

circuit and packet switching.
communication environment. 2- Differentiate various telecommunication
2- Have a working knowledge of carrier technologies.
basic data communication 3- Identify and describe PSTN and
components, their wideband channels, as well as digital
Interfacing and internetworking transmission facilities
3-Carry out the evaluation and 4- Having a working knowledge of ISDN,
Frame Relay and ATM networks.
application of computer 5- Identify and describe the operations of
communication. different digital networks

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 4.1 Switching
• Switching is a mechanism which relaying/forwarding
voice/data on the medium.
• It is divided into two types:
– Circuit Switching
• used for Voice communications.
• Examples of networks using circuit switching are PSTN
and ISDN.
– Packet Switching
• Used for data communication.
• Examples of networks using Packet switching is Ethernet,
Fast Ethernet, Gigabit Ethernet, Ethernet WAN, MPLS,
ATM, Frame Relay etc.
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 4.2 Circuit Switching
• In circuit switching, a dedicated path is used for all communications between
source & destination even if there are many potential paths through
intermediate devices may exist between the two users/devices.
• Communication is carried out in 3 steps:
– Connection establishment (link by link)
• Routing & resource allocation (FDM or TDM)
– Data transfer
– Connection termination/disconnect
• De-allocate the dedicated resources

Fig 4.1
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 4.2.1 Resource Multiplexing
• There are two techniques used for Resource Multiplexing.
• FDM: Frequency is divided among established circuits. Time is
full for each user.
• The Radio /TV broadcasting,
and cable TV network are examples

User5
User1

User2

User4
User3
Time
of FDM.
Frequency
• TDM: Time is divided among established circuits.
Frequency/Bandwidth is full.
User5
• TDM is used in Telephone User4
User3
switches nowadays.
Time User2
User1
Fig 4.2
Frequency
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 4.2.2 Characteristics of Circuit Switching
• Resources Issue (Inefficiency):
– In circuit switching, resources remain allocated during the
full length of a communication, even when no data is
flowing on circuit thus causing the wastage of resources.
• Connection Overhead (Delay):
– Irrespective of the amount of data required to be
transferred, each transmission need to establish a
connection, which takes time. All the paths/routes are
defined in this process from source to destination.
• Data transmission:
– In circuit switching, data transmission is fast as circuit is
already established, routes are defined and resources are
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 4.3 Packet Switching
• In Packet switching there is no fixed route for data transfer. Data is
transmitted in the form of small block called Packet. Each Packet
contains Data as well as Control information including the routing
information.
• For example, at the order of 1000 bytes Longer messages are split
into series of packets. Each packet contains a portion of user data
& routing information.

Fig 4.3
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 4.3.1 Characteristics of Packet Switching
• Single link can be shared by multiple packets and by
multiple nodes.
• There is no wastage of resources (Channel capacity)
and switches accept data packets even if network is
busy as they buffer them and transmit later on. But in
Circuit Switching, a connection could be blocked if
there lacks free resources or if the users are using the
path without any data transferring.
• No overhead of connection establishment.
• More overhead in Packet as each packet contains
complete control/routing information.

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 4.4. Circuit Switching vs. Packet Switching
1. Circuit is established before 1. No circuit setup required.
transmission and terminated at
end. 2. In Packet Switching routing
2. In Circuit Switching routing decisions are taken for every
decision is taken once for whole packet.
communication at connection
setup time. 3. Routing information need to be
3. Routing information required to maintained on switches in
be maintained by switches is less packet switching can be very
in circuit switching. large.
4. All data travels through same
4. Different Packets can travel
through different routes so
path. need to have complete
5. If any device in the route will go information of Source &
down or any sort of topology destination nodes.
change happens then circuit 5. In case of any topology change,
needs to be established again and no damage will happen as route
all the data on the way will be is not fixed and packets can
lost. follow some other route.
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 4.4 PSTN
• PSTN, which standard for Public Switched Telephone
Network, refers to the network of typical telephone
lines and carrier equipment that service most homes.
• PSTN may also be called plain old telephone service
(POTS).
• The PSTN comprises the entire telephone system, from
the lines that connect homes and businesses to the
network centers that connect different regions of a
country.

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 4.4.1 PSTN Architecture

Fig 4.4 (EEE_Data Com._21/8/2020) Version 3.0

 4.4.2. Local Loop
• The portion of the PSTN that connects your house to
the nearest central office is known as the local loop,
or the last mile.

Fig 4.5
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 4.5. Digital Local loop technologies
• Following are the main digital local loop technologies.
– ISDN using Voiceband Modem
– ADSL using ADSL Modem
– Digital Leased line (T1/E1) use CSU/DSU
– Fiber Optics broadband using Optical converter

Fig 4.6
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 4.6. ISDN connections
• ISDN is a dialup connection based technology, which
allows to transmit voice and data on the same
channels.
• It works at 2 speeds including 64kbps and 128kbps.
• There are 2 types of connections.
– BRI (2B+D) – 2 B channels and 1 D channel
– PRI (23B+D) – 23 B channels and 1 D channel

Fig 4.7
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 4.7. ADSL Connections
• A Digital Subscriber Line (DSL) is a high-speed, always-on,
connection technology that uses existing twisted-pair
telephone lines to provide IP services to users.
• It provides higher download bandwidth to the user than
upload bandwidth.

Fig 4.8
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 4.8. Fiber Optics connections
• FTTH (Fiber to the Home):
– Fiber reaches the boundary of the residence.
– Its speed ranges between 100 Mbps – 200Mbps and up to
Gbps.
• FTTB (Fiber to the Building):
– Fiber reaches the boundary of the building, where final
connection to the individual living space being made via
alternative means.

Fig 4.9

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 4.9. T-1/T-3 Carriers
• This type of connectivity is used by organizations requiring high bandwidth
to run Internet based server applications like web servers, mail servers,
application servers etc.
Carrier No. of channels Data rate
T1 24 1.544Mbps
T3 672 43.7 Mbps

Fig 4.10
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 References
1- Stallings William, (2014) Data and Computer Communication (10th ed.). Pearson Education.
2- Data Communications and Networking 5th Edition By Behrouz A. Forouzan ISBN10:
0073376221 ISBN13: 9780073376226 Copyright: 2013
3. Cisco CCNA Module-3 Course material

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