Patent ID: 7099316

Claim:
A photonic area network to distribute a plurality of data bandwidth segments from a plurality of external networks to a plurality of peripheral devices, the photonic area network comprising: a wide-signal bandwidth multi-access channel; a head-end communications circuit to format the data bandwidth segments into a multiplexed signal transmittable via the wide-signal bandwidth multi-access channel, wherein the head-end communications circuit comprises a bi-directional interface operably coupled to the external networks and to the multi-access channel; a plurality of set top box circuits each comprising: a microcontroller containing memory; and a peripheral device interface operably coupled to the plurality of peripheral devices to process the data bandwidth segments, wherein each of the set-top box circuits are operably coupled, in a ring network configuration, to the multi access channel; and; a program, executed by the set-top box microcontroller, to route the data bandwidth segments according to a software subscription table stored in the memory.