Patent ID: 7123623

Claim:
A data switch comprising: a plurality of cross bar switches, each cross bar switch having a plurality of switch input ports and a plurality of switch output ports, each switch input port of each cross bar switch being operatively coupled to and associated with: a plurality of input data queues, each input data queue having an input port capable of receiving data packets, each of said input data queues also having an output port coupled to a corresponding switch input port of a corresponding cross bar switch; a plurality of data demultiplexers, each data demultiplexer having: a data input port at which a data stream S is received, and each demultiplexer having a plurality of data output ports each of which is coupled to a separate one of the input data queues associated with each corresponding cross bar switch input port; wherein each data demultiplexer directs each data packet of the respective data stream S to a particular input data queue having a smallest amount of queued data packets; a global scheduler operatively coupled to said data demultiplexers and to each of said data input data queues, said global scheduler controlling the routing of data from said plurality of switch input ports to said plurality of switch output ports.