Patent ID: 6658010
Filing Date: 2003-12-02
Classification: H04H,H04L,H04N,H04W,Y02D

Abstract:
In a two-way asymmetric communication system for effecting communication between a host and a plurality of remote devices over a high-speed downstream channel and plural lower speed upstream channels interposed between said host and said remote devices, the improvement comprising:a shared medium including said downstream channels and said plural upstream channels that convey information between the remote devices and the host, said plural upstream channel that has a capacity to convey data at a rate higher than a rate of the lower speed upstream channel, said remote devices being adjustably assigned to one of the higher and lower speed upstream channels, and a network manager that effects monitoring of usage of said higher speed upstream channels and balancing of traffic loads in said upstream channels by reassigning a requesting remote device otherwise assigned to a lower speed upstream channel to a higher speed upstream channel and to a demand by said requesting remote device for a higher upstream data transfer rate; wherein said network manager balances traffic loads in accordance with at least one bandwidth reserved by other remote devices an a class of service assigned to the requesting remote device; wherein said network manager effects assignment of an upstream transmit frequency to remote devices in accordance with a quality of said downstream channels; wherein said network manager provides forward error correction to control packets transmitted over said downstream channel to said remove processor devices.