The most common data exchange methods in communication networks are circuit switching ( Circuit Switching) and packet switching (Packet Switching) . The main difference between them is that packet switching is connectionless, while circuit switching is connection-oriented ; The data transfer impact to the receiver varies.
1. Circuit switching is defined as the switching method used to establish a dedicated communication path between a sender and a receiver. The link established between the sender and receiver is physical, analog telephone networks are a well known example of circuit switching, and data has a fixed bandwidth before and after the exchange.
1.1 Advantages of circuit switching
• The bandwidth used by the terminal is fixed;
• Communication quality improves with use of dedicated communication channels;
• The data transmission rate is fixed;
• There is no need to wait for data switching;
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Circuit switching is the first choice when the communication time is long and the data is continuous.
1.2 Disadvantages of circuit switching
• Due to the use of dedicated channels, more bandwidth is required;
• The utilization of network resources cannot be fully utilized;
• With dedicated channels, other data transfers become impossible;
• It takes a long time to establish a physical link between two sites;
• Circuit switching is expensive because all connections are established using dedicated paths;
The link between the sender (terminal) and the recipient (terminal) is always maintained, unless the user terminates the link; if there is no data transmission during this period, the link will always be maintained.
2. Packet switching is defined as a connectionless network in which (data) messages are divided and combined into packets. Each packet is routed from source to destination as an independent packet. The actual data in these packets is carried by the payload; when the packets arrive at the destination, it is the responsibility of the destination to put the packets in the correct order.
2.1 Advantages of Packet Switching
• There is no delay in packet delivery, they are sent to the destination as soon as they are available;
• Does not require a large amount of storage space, and the information is delivered to the destination as soon as it is received in the network;
• Link failure will not affect the delivery of data, because data packets can be routed from other paths;
• Multiple users can use the same channel during packet transmission;
• Bandwidth utilization is higher with packet switching because multiple sources can transmit packets from the same source link.
2.2 Disadvantages of packet switching
• Packet switching is expensive to deploy;
• Packet transmission becomes easy when complex protocols are used;
• High-quality voice calls cannot use packet switching, because the communication delay is relatively large;
• Network element connection problems may result in loss of information or delays in the delivery of information.
3. Circuit Switching vs. Packet Switching
Circuit switching refers to a data transmission technique that utilizes sending a message from one point to another, which involves simultaneously sending a message from a receiver to a sender and back. During this process, the sending end establishes a physical connection with the receiving end, and there is always a dedicated circuit to handle the data transmission, and the data is sent through this circuit. Packet switching can be used as an alternative to circuit switching, in which data is sent in discrete units of variable length; the comparison is shown in the table below:
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