Broadcom Corporation

Gale Shallow

Niki Roberta Pantelias

Lisa Voigt Denney

Kenneth G Zaleski, Ii

John Daniel Horton

A traffic prioritization system and method performs a coarse classification of upstream bursts at the physical interface of a wireless communications device. The wireless device monitors and controls communications with a plurality of remote wireless communications devices throughout a widely distributed network, including the Internet. The traffic prioritization system includes a burst receiver that receives and sends the upstream bursts to a classifier. At an appropriate time, the classifier receives the upstream bursts and queries a priority lookup table (LUT) to determine a priority classification. The priority classification is used to separate the bursts into two or more priority levels. The higher priority level is used to designate services having a low tolerance for delay, such as telephony. Upon classification, the upstream bursts are forwarded to one of several priority queues. Each priority queue corresponds to at least one priority level. The headend device services each priority queue such that the higher priority queues are serviced before the lower priority queues.

Method for upstream priority lookup at physical interface within a wireless device

A system and method is presented that uses hardware at a central node to determine if bandwidth being provided to a remote node in accordance with an unsolicited grant service (UGS) flow requires adjustment. In one embodiment, the hardware performs this function by comparing information in two consecutively-received UGS extended headers from the same remote device. If the information in the current and previous UGS extended headers differ, then an indication is provided to software of the central node that the bandwidth being provided to the remote node requires adjustment.

Method for determining whether adequate bandwidth is being provided during an unsolicited grant flow

Hardware filtering of unsolicited grant service extended headers

A traffic prioritization system performs a coarse classification of upstream bursts at the physical interface of a headend communications device. The headend device monitors and controls communications with a plurality of remote communications devices throughout a widely distributed network, including the Internet. The traffic prioritization system includes a burst receiver that receives and sends the upstream bursts to a classifier. At an appropriate time, the classifier receives the upstream bursts and queries a priority lookup table (LUT) to determine a priority classification. The priority classification is used to separate the bursts into two or more priority levels. The higher priority level is used to designate services having a low tolerance for delay, such as telephony. Upon classification, the upstream bursts are forwarded to one of several priority queues. Each priority queue corresponds to at least one priority level. The headend device services each priority queue such that the higher priority queues are serviced before the lower priority queues.

Method and system for upstream priority lookup at physical interface

A system and method is presented to utilize hardware instead of software to compare for bandwidth request changes between two consecutively received unsolicited grant service (UGS) extended headers for the same service identifier (SID), obtains significant savings in CPU cycles for the CMTS software. The system determines whether adequate bandwidth is being provided from a cable modem termination system to a data provider during a unsolicited grant service flow. The system includes a means for receiving a current voice packet in the unsolicited grant service flow at the cable modem termination system from the data provider, where the current voice packet comprises a unsolicited grant service extended header. The system further includes means for comparing the current unsolicited grant service extended header with a previous unsolicited grant service extended header. If the current and previous unsolicited grant service extended headers differ, then means for indicating to the software of the CMTS that the bandwidth being provided to the cable modem needs adjusted (either increased or decreased) for the unsolicited grant service flow.

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Marietta, GA, United States of America

Gale Shallow