Interface
Conversion
-------------
ARC-101

Features

• Modular ATM Rate and Media Converter

• Connects ATM devices with different rates and/or interfaces

• Supports Available Bit Rate (ABR) traffic management for avoiding cell loss

• Transparent to ATM protocols

• Modules available for the following electrical interfaces:

  • 2 Mbps (E1) over coax/UTP

  • 34 Mbps (E3) over coax

  • 45 Mbps (T3) over coax

  • 155 Mbps (STS-3c) over Cat-5 UTP

  • 155 Mbps (STS-3c/STM-1) over coax

• Supports single mode or multimode 155 Mbps STS-3c/STM-1(SONET/SDH) optical interfaces:

• Complies with ATM forum specifications

Description

• ARC-101, ATM rate and media converter, provides transparent rate and media conversion between two ATM interfaces by extracting ATM cells from one interface and sending them over the second one.

• ARC-101 connects devices with dissimilar ATM interfaces. Alternatively, ARC-101 can be used in ATM testing environments, enabling module interchangeability according to the devices being tested.

• A large internal FIFO is used for rate adaptation between the two interfaces and for handling the bursty nature of the ATM traffic. Special circuitry is responsible for closing the ATM flow control loop according to ABR traffic management specifications in order to avoid FIFO overflow

• ARC-101 supports a wide variety of ATM data rates and media types. These include:
  E1, E3, T3 and STS-3c/STM-1 over optical and electrical interfaces.

• The modular construction and software based design of ARC-101 enables easy migration to new ATM physical interfaces.

• Built-in diagnostics, configuration, statistics (including physical layer alarm surveillance/ performance monitoring) and ATM layer statistics are provided via the monitor connector (RS-232 ASCII terminal).

• ARC-101 is supplied as a standalone unit. Special hardware for mounting one or two units in a 19" rack using minimal height of 1U can be ordered separately (see Ordering).