RE: hdlc clock rate

From: Smith, Jason (JASmith@nuvox.com)
Date: Mon Mar 03 2008 - 12:05:16 ARST


Scott is exactly correct here, the clock rate has everything to do with
the data rate. Pulling out an Oscope as he suggests will show you
exactly how the clock signals (TXClk, RXClk and TT) all relate to TD and
RD. Without it the devise will not know when to read the data bit
correctly and is why they need to be sync'd. So when you have two
routers back to back, one set to DCE and the other DTE, the DCE clock
rate is the one that matters and not the DTE. The DTE will take the
TXClk signal from the DCE device and time its data rate to it, allowing
the DCE device to know when to read the TXdata that is coming in from
the DTE. The DTE will read the RXdata and RXclk to know how to receive
the data from the DCE. If you want to get fancy you can make the DTE
ignore the TXClk from the DCE and have it TX its own via TT. You set
the DCE device to sync to the TT clock and TD coming in. There is a lot
to it but after you worked and tested it for a long time it comes second
nature. You don't have to have BITs timing between devices as long as
the clock and data sync up correctly is all you want. But if you are
passing timing through devices that is where the real need comes from
it, you really want all the devices to be timed to the same source.

Thanks,
Jason Smith
CCIE #12097

-----Original Message-----
From: nobody@groupstudy.com [mailto:nobody@groupstudy.com] On Behalf Of
Scott Vermillion
Sent: Sunday, March 02, 2008 3:05 PM
To: 'Fang Gao'; 'Radioactive Frog'
Cc: 'Sadiq Yakasai'; 'Santi'; 'John'; ccielab@groupstudy.com
Subject: RE: hdlc clock rate

Well I don't want to get into a totally OT argument here, but clock rate
and
data rate are absolutely directly related on synchronous serial
interfaces.
Clock slows down, data rate adjusts downward accordingly. Clock speeds
up,
data rate adjusts upward accordingly. A clock signal on a serial
interface
is not some kind of time of day NTP thing, LOL! The "synchronization"
you
refer to is on a bit-by-bit basis. The clock signal is a square wave
whose
duty cycle or period drives directly the rate at which data is fed or
read
and dictates exactly the time at which the data leads are sampled. I've
looked at more clock signals on an o'scope and troubleshot more circuit
timing issues than I care to recall.

 

And the duty cycle of that clock signal is dictated by the clock-rate
command configured on the interface, BTW. Break out an o'scope and have
some fun.

 

As for BITS, yes, as I said, that can be used to time an ONS chassis or
the
like. However, it's generally considered an insufficiently accurate
clock
source for optical carriers and (at least in my day) was thus used
primarily
as a backup (so that SONET nodes wouldn't fall into a timing loop during
failure events in the ring). BITS came into the world to time
plesiochronous digital hierarchy (PDH) devices that predate SONET by
quite a
bit (T3 muxes, etc). But due to the proliferation of BITS in the telco
environment, it was only natural that somebody would go asking vendors
to
include a BITS input option (again, mainly for backup purposes). The
parallel between BITS and NTP is a very thin one at best. Yes, they
both
have to do with timing. But one has to do with exact time of day,
whereas
the other does not have anything to do with that at all.

 

For an interesting read on PDH and synchronous serial timing, check
this:

 

http://www.oreilly.com/catalog/t1survival/chapter/ch05.html

 

The discussion in this chapter is more broad that the discussion here,
so
you can skip to about the halfway point to "Clocking at the Data Port."
While the example is of a T-1 CSU/DSU and an attached DTE, the
discussion is
really generic to any DCE/DTE serial circuit. Whenever you see that
clock
square wave in a graphic, you're seeing a signal whose period dictates
the
speed at which data moves in a given direction. That period is dictated
by
the clock-rate command.

 

 

 

From: Fang Gao [mailto:fanggao@gmail.com]
Sent: Sunday, March 02, 2008 12:21 PM
To: Radioactive Frog
Cc: Scott Vermillion; Sadiq Yakasai; Santi; John; ccielab@groupstudy.com
Subject: Re: hdlc clock rate

 

Hi,

 

Clock rate has no direct relation with data-rate. (I assume we just talk
about clock rate configuration on the serial port in Cisco routers).

 

Clock rate is used only on SERIAL port to feed on clock pin in order to
synchronize the data stream between DCE and DTE.

 

The serial port (V35 or RS232, or high-speed....) has separate pins for
data
stream and clock. Clock-rate feeds the signal on Clock pin. The data go
through Tx/Rx data pins. They are not direct related. As long as DCE
and
DTE are synched., the data will transmit over the serial connection.

 

You can choose any available clock rate (by "clock rate ?") to configure
DCE
port.

 

BITS on Cisco 14545 optical switch is different story. BITS is used to
sync
SONET or SDH optical devices. BITS uses T1/E1 as a timing source,
similar to
NTP in cisco routers.

 

HTH

 

 

On Sat, Mar 1, 2008 at 10:41 PM, Radioactive Frog <pbhatkoti@gmail.com>
wrote:

I have seen 2 megs station clock feed even the link speed was 6 megs
using a
HWIC2T cards.

Check the specification of the HSSI port. IT takes 2 megs clock but can
support port speed upto 52 megs.

So ,.. still clock rate vs data-rate is unclear!

Frog



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