Ethernet Device Small Packet Aggregation Bandwidth Efficiency
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Solution Overview
Problem
Existing Ethernet devices have low transmission efficiency for small payload packets, especially in applications generating large amounts of short data packets, such as voice calls and online games, due to fixed overhead control fields, resulting in inefficient use of bandwidth.
Innovation Solution
The Ethernet device is equipped with a small packet aggregation function that encapsulates multiple small payload packets into aggregated Ethernet frames, ensuring compatibility with both old and new equipment by distinguishing between devices that support and do not support this function, and using appropriate parsing rules for different frame types.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Productivity
If multiple small payload packets are transmitted separately using standard Ethernet frames, then compatibility with old equipment is maintained, but transmission efficiency is low due to repeated fixed overhead
Solution Approach 1:
The patent merges multiple small payload packets into a single aggregated Ethernet frame by combining their data portions while sharing common overhead fields (preamble, start frame delimiter, redundancy check, interframe gap). This reduces the total number of frames transmitted and eliminates repeated overhead, directly improving transmission efficiency for small packets.
Solution Approach 2:
The aggregated Ethernet frame is segmented into distinct functional parts: a shared common overhead section, multiple data sections (each containing a payload packet with its own length field and data), and a shared redundancy check section. This segmentation allows receivers to efficiently parse and extract individual packets while maintaining the benefits of aggregation.
2Productivity
If small payload packets are aggregated into a single Ethernet frame, then transmission efficiency is improved, but compatibility with old equipment that does not support aggregation is lost
Solution Approach 1:
The Ethernet device dynamically adapts its transmission mode based on the capabilities of peer devices. Through LLDP capability exchange in the discovery phase, the device determines whether the peer supports small packet aggregation. If supported, aggregated frames are used for efficiency; if not, standard separate frames are used for compatibility. This dynamic adaptation resolves the contradiction between efficiency improvement and compatibility maintenance.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent changes the operational parameter of frame aggregation based on detected peer capabilities. The aggregation function is enabled or disabled as a configurable parameter depending on whether the peer device supports it, allowing the system to optimize performance when possible while maintaining compatibility when necessary.
3Reliability
If fixed overhead control fields are included in every Ethernet frame, then protocol compliance is ensured, but bandwidth utilization is reduced for small payload packets
Solution Approach 1:
The patent combines multiple payload packets into a single aggregated frame structure where the fixed overhead control fields (preamble, start frame delimiter, redundancy check, interframe gap) are shared across all packets in the aggregation. This eliminates the repetition of overhead for each small packet, significantly improving bandwidth utilization while maintaining all necessary protocol compliance elements within the aggregated structure.
Data Source
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AI summary
The invention discloses a high-efficiency transmission Ethernet device, and relates to the technical field of communication devices. The Ethernet device comprises a data transmitting module, wherein when receiving a data packet sent by an upper-layer device, and judging that other Ethernet devices in the same local area network for data transmission support a small packet aggregation function, the data transmitting module is configured to aggregately encapsulate all small packets contained in the data packet to form at least one aggregated Ethernet frame and to send it to other corresponding Ethernet devices; and a data receiving module, wherein when receiving data frames sent by other Ethernet devices in the same local area network supporting the small packet aggregation function, performing data parsing on the data frames according to a pre-configured routine parsing rule when judging that the received data frames are routine Ethernet frames, and performing data parsing on the data frames according to a pre-configured aggregation parsing rule when judging the data frames are aggregated Ethernet frames. The invention has advantages of effectively improving transmission efficiency in the case of Ethernet transmitting small payload packets while ensuring compatibility.