Patent ID: 7548558

Claim:
A subsystem for a cable modem termination apparatus to allow flexible upstream and downstream mapping, comprising: a downstream mapper having one or more inputs for coupling to DOCSIS downstream transmitters, and one or more outputs for coupling to hybrid fiber coaxial cable systems, and having a control input; an upstream mapper having one or more inputs for coupling to hybrid fiber coaxial cable systems and having one or more outputs for coupling to inputs of one or more DOCSIS upstream receivers, and having a control input; a control circuit coupled to said control inputs for generating signals which control which transmitters are coupled to which optical nodes and which optical nodes are coupled to which receivers, wherein said control circuit is a computer programmed with at least one upstream media access control process (UMAC) and a downstream media access control process (DMAC) for each DOCSIS downstream generated by one of said transmitters, and wherein said computer is programmed by said UMAC and DMAC processes to exchange data between said UMAC process and said DMAC processes to allow a flexible number of downstreams share the same upstream receiver.