25 Facts About Frame Relay

1.

Frame Relay is a standardized wide area network technology that specifies the physical and data link layers of digital telecommunications channels using a packet switching methodology.

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2.

Designers of Frame Relay aimed to provide a telecommunication service for cost-efficient data transmission for intermittent traffic between local area networks and between end-points in a wide area network .

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3.

Frame Relay puts data in variable-size units called "frames" and leaves any necessary error-correction up to the end-points.

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4.

Frame Relay can run on fractional T-1 or full T-carrier system carriers .

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5.

Frame Relay has its technical base in the older X 25 packet-switching technology, designed for transmitting data on analog voice lines.

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6.

Unlike X 25, whose designers expected analog signals with a relatively high chance of transmission errors, Frame Relay is a fast packet switching technology operating over links with a low chance of transmission errors, which means that the protocol does not attempt to correct errors.

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7.

Frame Relay often serves to connect local area networks with major backbones, as well as on public wide-area networks and in private network environments with leased lines over T-1 lines.

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8.

Frame Relay originated as an extension of integrated services digital network .

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9.

Frame Relay switches create virtual circuits to connect remote LANs to a WAN.

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10.

The Frame Relay network exists between a LAN border device, usually a router, and the carrier switch.

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11.

Frame Relay network uses a simplified protocol at each switching node.

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12.

Therefore, Frame Relay networks require some effective mechanisms to control the congestion.

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13.

Frame Relay defines some restrictions on the user's information rate.

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14.

Frame Relay began as a stripped-down version of the X 25 protocol, releasing itself from the error-correcting burden most commonly associated with X 25.

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15.

When Frame Relay detects an error, it simply drops the offending packet.

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16.

Frame Relay uses the concept of shared access and relies on a technique referred to as "best-effort", whereby error-correction practically does not exist and practically no guarantee of reliable data delivery occurs.

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17.

Frame Relay provides an industry-standard encapsulation, utilizing the strengths of high-speed, packet-switched technology able to service multiple virtual circuits and protocols between connected devices, such as two routers.

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18.

Frame Relay eliminates a number of the higher-level procedures and fields used in X 25.

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19.

Frame Relay was designed for use on links with error-rates far lower than available when X 25 was designed.

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20.

The frames in Frame Relay contain an expanded link layer address field that enables Frame Relay nodes to direct frames to their destinations with minimal processing.

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21.

The elimination of functions and fields over X 25 allows Frame Relay to move data more quickly, but leaves more room for errors and larger delays should data need to be retransmitted.

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22.

Frame Relay connections are often given a committed information rate and an allowance of burstable bandwidth known as the extended information rate .

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23.

Frame Relay aimed to make more efficient use of existing physical resources, permitting the over-provisioning of data services by telecommunications companies to their customers, as clients were unlikely to be using a data service 45 percent of the time.

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24.

In more recent years, Frame Relay has acquired a bad reputation in some markets because of excessive bandwidth overbooking.

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25.

Some early companies to make Frame Relay products included StrataCom and Cascade Communications .

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