THE MEDIUM ACCESS

SUBLAYER
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WHAT IS MEDIUM ACCESS CONTROL?

 Medium Access Control (MAC) is a sublayer of the data-link layer.

It is located at the
bottom of the data link
layer.
 This chapter deals with broadcast networks and their
protocols.
 In any broadcast network , the key issue is to
determine who gets to use the channel when there is
competition for it.
 The protocols used to determine who goes next on a
multiaccess channel.
 It is also referred as multiaccess channels or random
access channels.
Channel Allocation Problem

 Channel allocation is a process in which a single channel is

divided and allotted to multiple users in order to carry user
specific tasks.
1. Static Channel Allocation in LANs and MANs

 It is the classical or traditional approach of allocating a single

channel among multiple competing users 
Frequency Division Multiplexing (FDM).
 If there are N users, the bandwidth is divided into N equal sized
portions each user being assigned one portion.
 Since each user has a private frequency band, there is no
interference between users.
 This is efficient when there is only small number of users.
 However, when the number of senders is large and continuously
varying or the traffic is bursty, problems arise because some of the
users will be denied permission for lack of bandwidth, even if
some of the users are not using the (allocated) bandwidth.
 If the spectrum is cut up into N regions and fewer than N users are
currently interested in communicating, a large piece of valuable spectrum
will be wasted.
 If more than N users want to communicate, some of them will be denied
permission for lack of bandwidth, even if some of the users who have been
assigned a frequency band hardly ever transmit or receive anything.
 if the number of users is somehow kept constant, bandwidth can be wasted
because data traffic is often bursty, peak to mean traffic ratio's of 1000:1
are quite common.
 Some queuing theory calculations to show the inefficiency of FDM.
 Suppose a channel with a capacity of C bps, frames arriving according
a Poisson distribution with a mean of    /| frames/sec, each having a
length drawn from an exponential pdf (probability density function)
with mean 1/ U bits/frame. The mean time T a packet has to wait
before it can be send is then: T = 1 / (UC-/| ).
 Now the channel is divided into N independent channels with capacity
C/N bps, the mean input rate for each of the subchannels is then /| /N.
Then TFDM = 1 / ( U(C/N) -( /| /N) ) = N/ ( UC - /| ) = NT.
 The mean time delay for a packet to be send using FDM is thus N
times worse than if all the frames were somehow magically arranged
orderly in a big central queue.
EG:

 If C is 100 Mbps , the mean frame length 1/U ,is 10,000 bits and the
frame arrival rate,/|,is 5000 frames/sec , then
T=1/(UC-/|) =200Usec.

Now if 100-Mbps network with10 networks of 10 Mbps each and

statistically allocate each user to one of them , the mean delay would
jump from 200Usec to 2msec.

Tn=1/(U(C/N)-(/|/N))=N/(UC- /|)=NT
=200*10=2000usec=2msec.