The Medium Access Control

Sublayer
Module-4
ECC602

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Multiple Access Protocols

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 Random Access Protocols
• Also called as contention methods.

• No station is superior to other.

• Each station uses a procedure(protocol) to decide whether to

send.
• If more than one station tries to send there is access conflict –
collision – Frames get destroyed/modified.

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 ALOHA
• Developed at the University of Hawaii in early 1970.

• Designed for a radio (wireless) LAN, but it can be used on any

shared medium.
• Medium is shared between the stations.

• When a station sends data, another station may attempt todo so

at the same time.
• The data from the two stations collide and become garbled.
• Types- Pure and Slotted

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 Pure ALOHA
• Whenever any station transmits a frame, it expects
acknowledgement from the receiver.
• If acknowledgement is not received within specified time, the
station assumes that the frame has been destroyed.
• When time-out period passes, each station must wait for a
random amount of time before resending its frame(Backoff
Time).
• This randomness helps to avoid more collisions.

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•

Whenever two frames try to occupy the channel at

the same time, there will be a collision and both
will be damaged.

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 Slotted ALOHA
• Invented to improve the efficiency of pure ALOHA.

• Here,the time of shared channel is divided into discrete

intervals called slots.
• The stations can send a frame only at the beginning of the slot
and only one frame is sent in each slot.
• If any station is not able to place the frame onto the channel at
the beginning of the slot i.e. it misses the time slot then the
station has to wait until the beginning of the next time slot.

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CCN/Namita/MAC Sublayer 8
 Slotted ALOHA
• Invented to improve the efficiency of pure ALOHA.

• Here,the time of shared channel is divided into discrete

intervals called slots.
• The stations can send a frame only at the beginning of the slot
and only one frame is sent in each slot.
• If any station is not able to place the frame onto the channel at
the beginning of the slot i.e. it misses the time slot then the
station has to wait until the beginning of the next time slot.

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• There is still a possibility of collision if two stations try to
send at the beginning of the same time slot.
• Slotted ALOHA has an edge over pure ALOHA as chances of
collision are reduced to one-half.

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 Comparison of Pure and Slotted Aloha
• Vulnerable Time : Length of time in which there is a
possibility of collision.

• Pure Aloha = 2 x Tfr

• Slotted Aloha = Tfr

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Vulnerable Time in Pure ALOHA

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Vulnerable Time in Slotted ALOHA

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 Comparison of Pure and Slotted Aloha
• Vulnerable Time : Length of time in which there is a
possibility of collision.
– Pure Aloha = 2 x Tfr
– Slotted Aloha = Tfr
• Throughput – Average number of successfully transmitted
frames.
– Pure Aloha (η) = G x e-2G
– Slotted Aloha (η) = G x e-G
G= avg no. of frames generated during one frame
transmission time.

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• Maximum Throughput - Smax

– Pure Aloha = 1/2e = 0.184 ( when G =1/2)

– Slotted Aloha = 1/e = 0.368 ( when G =1)

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Throughput v/s Offered Traffic

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 Example
• A network transmits 200 bit frames on a shared channel of
200kbps.What is the throughput if the system produces-
– A) 1000 frames per sec

– B) 500 frames per sec

Calculate for both pure and slotted Aloha.

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