Patent ID: 7864757

Claim:
A packet switch for switching packets, carried in time slots, between traffic sources and traffic sinks, the switch having plural input sectors and output sectors, each input sector being arranged to hold at least one queue per output sector, each input sector having plural input ports, each input port being arranged to receive packets from respective traffic sources, each output sector having plural output ports and being arranged to hold at least one queue per output port, the input sectors being connected to the output sectors via links configured to afford speed-up of data transfer, the links comprising a set of optical links, each optical link being connected to plural optical switches and arranged to carry packets from a respective input sector to any of the plural output sectors, the set of optical links resulting in fixed connections between the input and output sectors according to a traffic matrix that includes elements that specify the time-average required capacity between each traffic source-traffic sink pair, wherein the packet switch includes a circuitry for controlling the plural optical switches to vary the resulting connections of the set of links in accordance with variations in the time-average capacity and not at a time slot rate.