Digital Telephony Over Cable: The PacketCable¿ Network

Breakthrough PacketCable technology will enable cable companies to deliver high-speed Internet access, video, and IP-based residential telephony across the same coax wires. Every major U.S. cable company has committed to deploying PacketCable. It is estimated that 11% of U.S. residential calls will be carried on PacketCable networks by 2005. This is the first comprehensive guide to PacketCable: architecture, components, and implementation. Evans introduces the PacketCable standard, its goals and the business and technical problems it is intended to solve. Next, he shows how PacketCable networks handle each key task they must perform, including network-based and distributed call signaling; provisioning telephony and other services through Multimedia Terminal Adapters; transmission of billing information; interoperability with the classic Public Switched Telephone Network, and more. Evans also shows how the PacketCable standard provides hooks for implementing advanced Quality of Service (QoS) applications. For implementers, managers, and others concerned with providing CATV, broadband Internet, and telephony services over cable networks, and for building IP telephony networks from scratch using shared-access architecture.