Video and Voice over Sonet or ATM

[chris-lau]

Currently, I am in midst of deciding what link layer protocol to use for my broadband client service provider network particular for voice and video. A lot of people have been telling that ATM is going to die and Sonet is better!!! I really wonder how true is their statement? Anybody has any idea about this? Thanks

[ciscomoderator]

While there are a number of professionals online who may be able to assist you with their experience in this area, I strongly recommend you direct your question to your Cisco design engineer at your local Cisco Sales office.

You can locate your local Cisco representative from this URL:

http://www.cisco.com/warp/public/779/servpro/contact.html

If anyone else in the forum has some advice, please reply to this thread.

Thank you for posting.

[j.seitz]

Although I am not a guru on this subject I have spent my fair share working for and with ISP's all over the US and they ALWAYS use both! What does this mean...ATM is not going out of style any time soon!

Maybe a better question is what is each technologies strong point?

0.02$

[rmavro]

ATM is like Beta tape. Beta tape gives higher quality, but the consumer market perferred VHS's longer recording time. Still, Beta is used by professionals when Quality counts. ATM is not going away, but is a primary means to carry IP and other traffic in a broadband network with different subscribers.

The reason it is so useful today is that it is available, proven, and it works well. It might be more challanging to get non-ATM broadband from a major carrier, and deliver native LAN service to your prem via ATM access muxes.

For Point-to-Point IP, SONET or Lamda (IP over fiber), is good, and a GigE varient is coming, but if multiple services are to be supported, ATM is a good choice until MPLS, DifServ, and dependable quality of service metrics for IP can really be deployed in a multivendor network.

After all, you are asking about voice and video where it is quite necessary deal with real time delay, latency, jitter, and where pure IP is more challanged.

I would encourage IP over ATM (IPOA, 1483 et al), as is done with most DSLAMs.

My 2 cents, anyway.