Re: ATM Wide-Area Networks (was: sell shell accounts?)

[salo () msc edu (Tim Salo)]

> Date: Tue, 23 Jul 1996 14:28:27 -0400
> From: Paul Ferguson <pferguso () cisco com>
> Subject: Re: ATM Wide-Area Networks (was: sell shell accounts?)
>       [...]
> It depends on what you mean when you say 'performance'. I think
> there is more and more interest being vested in ATM inefficiency,
> and alternate technologies to better efficiency in the long-haul.
>
> Recall Jerry Scharf's numbers; they're indicative of the issue.
>       [...]
> HDLC framing bytes =   3080633605             HDLC efficiency = 97.72
> ATM framing bytes =   3644304857              ATM efficiency = 82.61
> ATM w/snap framing bytes =   3862101043       ATM w/snap efficiency = 77.95

At a certain point, some of these arguments about ATM efficiency sound a bit
like saying FDDI is terrible because 4B/5B encoding is only 80% efficient.

I think a more interesting measure of the value of ATM versus other 
wide-area technologies is some sort of measure of throughput per dollar.

-tjs
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