Patent ID: 8488602

Claim:
A method of operating an access node, comprising: storing group membership information indicating a set of group members associated with a wireless interface of said access node; receiving multicast packets; selecting for each received multicast packet, by a base station or wireless access router acting as a point of attachment for the group members to the access node, a first mode of multicast packet delivery based only on a number of group members in said set of group members being less than or equal to a predetermined number, said first mode of multicast packet delivery being a mode in which a separate copy of the multicast packet is transmitted to each group member in said set of group members; and selecting for each received multicast packet, by the base station or wireless access router of the access node, a second mode of multicast packet delivery based only on the number of group members in said set of group members being greater than said predetermined number, the second mode of multicast packet delivery being a mode in which a single copy of the multicast packet is transmitted to said set of group members, wherein the group membership information further comprises a cost estimate for transmitting a separate copy of the multicast packet to each group member in said set of group members or a cost estimate for transmitting a single copy of the multicast packet to said set of group members.