TORUS-switch: A scalable internal speed-up ATM switch architecture and its 5 Gbit/s switch LSI

A high speed and scalable ATM switch architecture, the TORUS-switch, is proposed. The switch is an internal speed-up crosspoint switch with cylindrical configuration. The self-bit-synchronisation technique is adopted to achieve high speed cell transmission without requiring high-density implementation technology. Distributed contention control based on the fixed output-precedence scheme is adopted. This control is so simple that the control circuit is achieved with only one gate in each crosspoint. A TORUS-switch is fabricated as an ultrahigh speed crosspoint LSI using the advanced Si-bipolar process. Measured results confirm that the TORUS-switch can be used to realise an expandable terabit-rate ATM switch that is also efficient.