Patent ID: 7564852

Claim:
An Optical Line Terminator (OLT) apparatus for use in an Ethernet Passive Optical Network (EPON) having at least one OLT in optical communication with one or more Optical Network Units (ONUs), said OLT apparatus comprising: a Dynamic Bandwidth Allocation (DBA) module, for generating a transmission grant schedule for each of the ONUs through the use of a DBA algorithm, said DBA module operationally comprising: a hardware Dynamic Bandwidth Allocation (DBA) module, including a simplified DBA algorithm implemented within an Applications Specific Integrated Circuit (ASIC); or a software DBA module, including a comprehensive DBA algorithm implemented within a set of software executing on a microprocessor; a DBA hardware accelerator, in communication with the DBA module, said DBA hardware accelerator including: a REPORT table containing ONU queue length information conveyed in recent REPORT messages received from the ONUs; a GRANT table containing grant start times and grant lengths for the ONUs for a next cycle; an MPCP module, for providing communications between the OLT and the ONUs via MultiPont-to-Point control protocol; and an EPON port, for providing communication between the MPCP module and the ONUs; wherein either the hardware DBA module or the software DBA module within the DBA module are made operational as selected and/or configured by a user, and the OLT utilizes the selected and/or configured DBA module to generate a GRANT table indicative of EPON upstream bandwidth allocation for the ONUs for each cycle of operation in response to REPORT messages received by the OLT from the ONUs for a previous cycle.