Unit-IV: Transmission Media

Guided Media: Twisted-Pair Cable-Coaxial Cable-Fiber-Optic Cable

Unguided Media: Wireless- Radio Waves-Microwaves-Infrared.
Switching: Circuit-Switched Networks - Three Phases – Efficiency – Delay - Circuit-Switched
Technology in Telephone Networks - Datagram Networks - Routing Table
GUIDED TRANSMISSION MEDIA (WIRED TRANSMISSION MEDIA)
Guided media send data using a physical conductor.
Types
(i) Twisted-Pair Cable
A twisted pair consists of two conductors (normally copper), each with its own plas c insula on, twisted
together, as shown in Figure. A number of such wires are bundled together.

Insulator

 It decreases crosstalk interference.

 Data rates are in 10 Mbps to 1 Gbps.
 It is cheap.
 It can be used for both analog and digital transmissions.
 It is limited in distance, bandwidth and data rate.

Twisted Pair Cable is of two types:

Unshielded Twisted Pair Shielded Twisted Pair
Metal shield

Plas c cover Plas c cover

Unshielded Twisted Pair Cable Shielded Twisted Pair Cable

It is ordinary telephone wire. The metal shield reduces noise and crosstalk.
The plas c cover acts as a protec ng layer for The plas c cover acts as a protec ng layer.
the conductor. This cable is bulky and expensive
Noise and crosstalk interfere with the signals.

Applica ons
 Twisted-pair cables are used in telephone lines to provide voice and data channels
 Local-area networks, such as lOBase-T use twisted-pair cables

(ii) Coaxial Cable

Coaxial cable (or coax) has a central core conductor (usually copper) enclosed in an insula ng sheath,
which is, in turn, encased in an outer conductor of metal foil. The outer metallic wrapping serves both as a
shield against noise and as the second conductor, which completes the circuit. This outer conductor is also
enclosed in an insula ng sheath, and the whole cable is protected by a plas c cover.
 It can be used over long distances. Insulator
 It can transmit both analog and digital signals.
 It has less interference.
Applica ons
 Coaxial cable is widely used in long distance telephone lines.
 Cable TV networks also use coaxial cables

(iii) Op cal Fiber

A fiber-op c cable is made of glass or plas c and
transmits signals in the form of light. Op cal fibers use reflec on to guide light through a channel. A glass or
plas c core is surrounded by a cladding of less dense glass or plas c. The outermost layer is called the jacket.

Sender Receiver

Characteris cs:
It transmits light by means of total internal reflec on.
There are 3 types of op cal fiber transmission
modes:
a) Step index mul mode: Rays at shallow angles are
reflected and propagated along the fiber. Other rays
are absorbed by the surrounding material. It is used
for short distance transmission.
b) Graded-index mul mode: The refrac on index can
be varied. Instead of zig-zagging, light curves
helically. They are used in LANs.
c) Single mode: This has the best performance. There
is a single transmission path. It is used for long-
distance transmissions in telephones and cable
televisions.

Applica ons
 Local-area networks such as 100Base-FX network (Fast Ethernet) and 1000Base-X use fiber-op c cable
 A few cable TV networks also use it.
Advantages over twisted pair or coaxial cable:
 Has greater capacity. Data rate can be 100s of Gbps.
 Has smaller size and lighter weight.
 Has lower a enua on.
 Not affected by electromagne c fields.
 Needs fewer repeaters

UNGUIDED TRANSMISSION MEDIA (WIRELESS TRANSMISSION MEDIA)

Unguided media transport signals by means of an antenna.
Isotrophic Antenna
Antenna: is an electrical conductor used for radia ng or collec ng electromagne c energy.
It is of two types :
a) Isotropic antenna: which can radiate power in all direc ons.
b) Parabolic reflec ve antenna: has a curved surface to direct the waves; it has high direc vity.

Parabolic Antenna
There are 3 types of Unguided media:
(i)Radiowaves

 These are waves ranging in frequencies between 3 kHz and 1 GHz.

 Radio waves are omnidirec onal. When an antenna transmits radio waves, they are propagated in all
direc on
 They can travel long distances. This makes radio waves a good candidate for long-distance broadcas ng.
Applica ons
 Used for broadcas ng radio and television signals
(ii) Microwaves
 These waves range in frequencies between 1 and 300 GHz.
 Microwaves are unidirec onal. When an antenna transmits microwave waves, they are narrowly
focused.
Applica ons
 Microwaves, due to their unidirec onal proper es, are very useful when unicast (one-to-one)
communica on is needed between the sender and the receiver.
 They are used in cellular phones, satellite networks and wireless LANs

(iii) Infrared
 Infrared waves have frequencies from 300 GHz to 400 THz
 They can be used for short-range communica on.
 Infrared waves cannot penetrate walls. This advantageous characteris c prevents interference
between one system and another
 It cannot be affected by signals in the next room.
 This same characteris c makes infrared signals useless for long-range communica on.
Applica ons
 It can be used to transmit digital data with a very high data rate.
 It can be used for communica on between devices such as keyboards, mouse and printers.

Switching
When there are mul ple devices, one solu on to connect the devices is using a point-to-point connec on.
However, this becomes costly when applied
to a large network. A be er solu on is
switching.
A switched network consists of a series of
interlinked nodes, called switches.
Switches are hardware and /or so ware
devices which create a temporary
connec on between two or more devices.
Data entering the network from a sta on
are routed to des na on by being switched
from node to node.
Example: In the figure: A to J is end systems.
I to V are switches.

Two technologies used in Switched networks are:

 Circuit switching
 Packet switching
CIRCUIT SWITCHING NETWORKS
A circuit-switched network consists of a set of
switches connected by physical links. Fig.4.2
 In circuit-switching there is a
dedicated communica on path
between two sta ons.
 The path is a sequence of
connec ons.
 The path exists ll the data transfer is
completed.
Three phases
Circuit-switching involves three phases:
1. Circuit establishment:
 Before any data transfer starts, an
end-to –end circuit must be formed.
 For example, in the Fig 4.2, if node A
wishes to send data to node M:
 Node A first sends a request to Switch I asking for a connec on to M.
 Now a link between A and Switch I is formed.
 Based on rou ng informa on, Switch I select Switch IV.
 So far, a dedicated link is formed from A through Switch I to Switch IV.
 The rest of the path is formed similarly. The path formed is A – Switch I – Switch IV – Switch III – M
 Once the connec on is complete, a test is made to find out if E is busy or ready to accept the
connec on.
2. Data transfer
 Informa on is now transmi ed from A to E.
 The path is A – 4 link, internal switching from 4 – 5, internal switching from 5 – 6 and finally 6 –E
link.
3. Circuit disconnect
 A er data transfer, the connec on is terminated.
 Signals are sent to nodes 4, 5 and 6 to deallocate the resources.
Efficiency
It can be argued that circuit-switched networks are not as efficient as the other two types of
networks because resources are allocated during the en re dura on of the connec on. These resources are
unavailable to other connec ons. In a telephone network, people normally terminate the communica on
when they have finished their conversa on. However, in computer networks, a computer can be connected
to another computer even if there is no ac vity for a long me. In this case, allowing resources to be dedicated
means that other connec ons are deprived.

Delay
Although a circuit-switched network normally has low efficiency, the delay in this type of network
is minimal. During data transfer the data are not delayed at each switch; the resources are allocated for the
dura on of the connec on.

Applica ons of Circuit-Switched Networks:

 It is used in analog telephones
 It is used in Private Branch Exchange (PBX) to interconnect telephones within building.
Example: Public Telephone Network
A public telecommunica ons
network is shown in Fig.4.2. It
consists of the following
components:
Subscribers: are the devices that
a ach to the network.
Subscriber Line: is the link between
subscriber and network. It is also
called Subscriber loop.
Exchanges: are the switching centers
in the network.
End-office: is the switching center
that directly supports subscribers.
Trunks: are the branches between
exchanges.
End office switches traffic between
subscribers a and b. Subscriber c is
connected to d through an
intermediate exchange.

SWITCHING CONCEPTS

Elements of a Circuit-Switch Node

Digital switch: provides a transparent signal path between any pair of a ached devices. Transparent path
means the devices appear to have a direct connec on between them.
Network Interface: represents the func ons and hardware needed to connect digital devices. It provides the
logic in Analog telephones for conver ng to digital signals.
Control Unit: performs three func ons.
 It establishes connec ons. It handles and acknowledges a request.
 It maintains the connec on. Switching elements must be handled due to me division principles.
 It tears down the connec on on request from one of its nodes.

An important characteris c of circuit-switching device is whether it is

blocking or non-blocking.
A blocking network is a network which is unable to connect two sta ons
because all possible paths are already in use. Example: short dura on Fig 4.3
voice traffic
A non-blocking network allows all sta ons to be connected at once as
long as the sta on is free. Example: long dura on data entry traffic.

Two switching techniques used internally in a circuit-switching node:

 Space Division Switching
 Time Division Switching

Space Division Switching

In a space-division switch, the signal paths are physically separate. Each
connec on requires establishing a physical path through switches.
  The basic building block of the switch is a metallic cross-
point or semiconductor gate that is controlled by a control
unit.
 A simple cross-bar matrix is shown in Fig.4.4.
 It has 10 full-duplex I/O lines.
 It has 10 inputs and 10 outputs.
 Interconnec on is possible through the cross-points. It is
non-blocking.
Limita ons:
 The number of cross-points increases as the number of I/O
sta ons increases. This is costly.
 Loss of a crosspoint prevents connec on between some Fig.4.4
devices.
 Only a small frac on of the
crosspoints is ac ve at a me.

To overcome these limita ons, mul -stage

switches are used.

Three-Stage Space Division Switch:

 The number of crosspoints are
reduced.
 There are several paths to
connect two devices.
 It is a blocking switch.
 In Fig.4.5, input 10 cannot be
connected to output 3, 4 or 5.
 To make it non-blocking, the
number of intermediate
switches must be increased.

Time Division Switching

Time division switching makes use of me-division mul plexing. Crosspoints can be shared between sta ons
for par cular me slots. Two popular methods used are : 1) TSI 2) TDM Bus.
In the figure, there are 4 sta ons 1, 2, 3 and 4. They transmit data A, B, C and D respec vely. Output must be
reached in the following order:
1 -> 4 ; 2 -> 1 ; 3 -> 3 ; 4 -> 2 (i.e data must be sent in the order B, D, C, A)
Without switching, data is sent in the order A, B, C, D.
With switching, the Control unit changes the order of the data sent in the required manner. (Fig.4.6 b and Fig
4.7) Time Slot Interchange (TSI) changes the ordering of the slots. TSI consists of Random Access Memory
(RAM). The RAM slots get filled up with incoming data. Slots are sent out in the order according to the control
unit.
ROUTING IN CIRCUIT SWITCHED NETWORKS
Hierarchical rou ng:
 The switches are organized into a tree structure or hierarchy.
 A path is found from the sender, tracing up the tree to the first
common node.
 High-usage trunks are connected to deal with high volume of
traffic.
 However, this rou ng is sta c, i.e. it does not adapt to
changing condi ons.
 Node failures lead to conges on.
Dynamic rou ng
 Rou ng decisions are taken according to traffic.
 Nodes have peer rela onship rather than hierarchical rela onship. i.e. all nodes perform the same
func on
 Rou ng becomes complex because paths are not provided. They must be found for each transfer.
 Rou ng becomes flexible because several alternate routes can be taken.
Alternate rou ng
 The possible routes between two sta ons are
pre-defined.
 The switch chooses the correct path for each
call.
 Each switch has a set of preplanned routes for
each des na on.
 The switch chooses the best path for every
call.
 This op mizes the use of network resources.
 In fixed alternate rou ng, each source-
des na on pair has only one rou ng.
 In dynamic alternate rou ng, rou ng
decisions are taken based on current traffic
status and previous traffic pa erns.
An example is shown in Fig.4.8. The source is X
and the des na on is Y. Direct route ‘a’ is tried
first. If it is unavailable, the other routes are
tried according to the rou ng table. Example,
in the mornings, route ‘b’ is tried next.
 PACKET SWITCHING :

The packet switching is a switching technique in which the message is sent in one go, but it is
divided into smaller pieces, and they are sent individually.
1. The message splits into smaller pieces known as packets and packets are given a unique
number to iden fy their order at the receiving end.
2. Every packet contains some informa on in its headers such as source address, des na on
address and sequence number.
3. Packets will travel across the network, taking the shortest path as possible.
4. All the packets are reassembled at the receiving end in correct order.
5. If any packet is missing or corrupted, then the message will be sent to resend the message.
6. If the correct order of the packets is reached, then the acknowledgment message will be
sent.
Advantages of Packet Switching:
1. Cost-effec ve: In packet switching technique, switching devices do not require massive secondary storage
to store the packets, so cost is minimized to some extent. Therefore, we can say that the packet switching
technique is a costeffec ve technique.
2. Reliable: If any node is busy, then the packets can be rerouted. This ensures that the Packet Switching
technique provides reliable communica on.
3. Efficient: Packet Switching is an efficient technique. It does not require any established path prior to the
transmission, and many users can use the same communica on channel simultaneously, hence makes use
of available bandwidth very efficiently.
Disadvantages of Packet Switching:
1. Packet Switching technique cannot be implemented in those applica ons that require low delay and high-
quality services.
2. The protocols used in a packet switching technique are very complex and requires high implementa on
cost.
3. If the network is overloaded or corrupted, then it requires retransmission of lost packets. It can also lead
to the loss of cri cal informa on if errors are nor recovered.
APPROACHES OF PACKET SWITCHING There are two approaches to Packet Switching:
 Datagram Packet switching
 Virtual Circuit Switching
Datagram Packet switching
1. It is a packet switching technology in which packet is known as a datagram, is considered as an
independent en ty.
2. Each packet contains the informa on about the des na on and switch uses this informa on to forward
the packet to the correct des na on.
3. The packets are reassembled at the receiving end in correct order.
4. In Datagram Packet Switching technique, the path is not fixed. o Intermediate nodes take the rou ng
decisions to forward the packets.
5. Datagram Packet Switching is also known as connec onless switching.
6. There are no setup or teardown phases.
7. Each packet is treated the same by a switch regardless of its source or des na on.

Rou ng Table
In this type of network, each switch (or packet switch) has a rou ng table which is based on the
des na on address. The rou ng tables are dynamic and are updated periodically. The des na on addresses
and the corresponding forwarding output ports are recorded in the tables.

Delay in a datagram network:

The packet travels through two switches.

 There are three transmission mes (3T),three propaga on delays (slopes 3t of the lines), and two
wai ng mes (w1 + w2).
 We ignore the processing me in each switch. Total delay = 3T + 3t + w1 + w2
Virtual Circuit Switching
1. Virtual Circuit Switching is also known as connec on-oriented switching.
2. In the case of Virtual circuit switching, a virtual connec on is established before the messages
are sent.
3. Call request and call accept packets are used to establish the connec on between sender and
receiver.
4. In this case, the path is fixed for the dura on of a logical connec on.
Virtual Circuit Iden fier (VCI):
A virtual circuit iden fier (VCI) that uniquely iden fies the connec on at this switch. A VCI, unlike
a global address, is a small number that has only switch scope; it is used by a frame between two switches.
When a frame arrives at a switch, it has a VCI; when it leaves, it has a different VCI.

Virtual Circuit Table:

Every Virtual Circuit (VC) maintains a table called Virtual Circuit table. One entry in the VC table on
a single switch contains the following:
1. An incoming interface on which packets for this VC arrive at the switch
2. An outgoing interface in which packets for this VC leave the switch
3. A outgoing VCI that will be used for outgoing packets
Example : Source A sends a frame to Source B through Switch 1, Switch 2 and Switch 3.

Types of Virtual Circuits 2. SVC – Switched Virtual Circuit

There are two broad classes of Virtual A host can send messages into the network to
Circuits. They are cause the state to be established. This is referred
1. PVC – Permanent Virtual Circuit as signaling. A host may set up and delete such a
Network Administrator will configure the state VC dynamically without the involvement of a
The virtual circuit is permanent (PVC) network administrator