"Andy Burns" wrote in message
...
On 18/09/2008 09:38, dennis@home wrote:

I dimension the UK for switched local access once and had it put to the
board at BT.
It was to give 100M access to every home

The limiting factor in that case is more likely to be the size of the MAC
address tables in the switches.

Not the way it was designed.
It still used IP and/or MPLS to route/switch between areas.
You could get a nice 16+2 port switch chip that supported MPLS.

The best thing was how everyone keeps telling me MPLS is a core protocol
when it looks like it could be very useful at the edge to do things like
switching different service types down different paths.

Another idea I see being copied is the idea of having different physical
ports dedicated to different services so that you don't have to delve into
the protocols to set priorities e.g. you plug your BT (IP) phone into ports
1, video into port 2, ... , internet port 4, etc. each with a different
plug. I never did like the idea that you needed to take a protocols apart to
set priorities.