Performance analysis of data traffic over TCP/IP, frame relay and ATM networks

The basic objectives of the research are to investigate the consequences of deploying TCP/IP. Frame Relay and OSPF simultaneously on a network. The objective of this research is to analyze the performances of these three protocols with respect to the response time after passing various kinds of traffic including voice traffic. The main area of the research is to design a network model and deploy different protocols to investigate the results of deployed protocols. Three networks having different backbones IP. Frame Relay and ATM were built. Applications (File Transfer, HTTP and E-mail) response time was checked. ATM and IP networks have equal latency in the experiment. Normally ATM networks showed minimum delays as compared to Frame Relay and IP. Results were collected for each application. In each application case ATM showed minimum variation and showed minimum response time than other Frame Relay and ATM networks. Furthermore voice traffic is added on the network to check it affects on other applications and to check how each of the network deals with voice traffic. Statistics were selected and simulation was run. Graphs were collected to check the performance of each network. Average value is calculated it is seen that ATM network are better in every case. It is strongly recommended that at the time of the selection of the protocols for a specific network the network administrator should be well aware about the performances of all protocols used as backbone of the networks. Prior to design a scenario a very critical need regarding the expertise of network administrator or designer is that he must be aware of all technicalities of network topologies, working of protocols, various troubleshooting situations, response time and end to end communication anomalies and traffic patterns etc. Among the various findings of our study the most important regarding the response time issues for all kinds of data are the better performance of ATM as compared to TCP/IP and Frame Relay. ATM found much better on basis of its good CPU utilization, less time consumption, better performance and ease in management.