DSP Interconnect Issues in Communications Infrastructure

Voice over packet systems today remain in their infancy. Systems are being rolled out, but for the most part these systems are in the trial stage, operating with relatively few channels and without severe cost imperatives. The architectures of these systems will evolve dramatically over the next couple years as trial systems evolve into production, and costs rapidly drop and channel densities increase. Under development today are architectures with hundreds of ports, a few with thousands. As the case for voice over packet strengthens, systems with tens of thousands of ports will emerge and further demands on the architecture will be made to satisfy the new bandwidth, latency and cost targets.