What is the advantage of ATM?
There are two main advantages: 1) ATM networks make a ‘virtual connection’ between origin and destination computers, so that data cells are sent along a known path from one computer to the other. When a connection is set up, it is allocated a certain amount of bandwidth, and this means that the speed at which data will be transferred across the network is known and will not vary however busy the network becomes. This makes it possible to use the network for applications such as high quality sound, where breaks in the transmission would be unacceptable, or cluster computing where different computers are connected together effectively forming a bigger computer. 2) Different sorts of data can be carried on an ATM network: voice signals and data signals can be carried.
