High-Speed Networks and Internets: Performance and Quality of Service (2nd Edition) (Hardcover)

by William Stallings (Author)

Editorial Reviews

Product Description
Provides extensive new coverage of approaches to Quality of Service and in-depth discussions of network design for high-speed TCP/IP and ATM networks. For all developers, systems engineers, network designers, students, and others involved in designing data communications and networking products or services.

From the Back Cover

William Stallings offers the most comprehensive technical book to address a wide range of design issues of high-speed TCP/IP and ATM networks in print to date. High-Speed Networks and Internets presents both the professional and advanced student an up-to-date survey of key issues. The Companion Website and the author's Web page offer unmatched support for students and instructors. The book features the prominent use of figures and tables and an up-to-date bibliography.

In this second edition, this award-winning and best-selling author steps up to the leading edge of integrated coverage of key issues in the design of high-speed TCP/IP and ATM networks to include the following topics:

• Unified coverage of integrated and differentiated services.
• Up-to-date and comprehensive coverage of TCP performance.
• Thorough coverage of next-generation Internet protocols including (RSVP), (MPLS), (RTP), and the use of Ipv6.
• Unified treatment of congestion in data networks; packet-switching, frame relay, ATM networks, and IP-based internets.
• Broad and detailed coverage of routing, unicast, and multicast.
• Comprehensive coverage of ATM; basic technology and the newest traffic control standards.
• Solid, easy-to-absorb mathematical background enabling understanding of the issues related to high-speed network performance and design.
• Up-to-date treatment of gigabit Ethernet.
• The first treatment of self-similar traffic for performance assessment in a textbook on networks (Explains the mathematics behind self-similar traffic and shows the performance implications and how to estimate performance parameters.)
• Up-to-date coverage of compression. (A comprehensive survey.)
• Coverage of gigabit networks. Gigabit design issues permeate the book.


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Product Details

• Hardcover: 715 pages
• Publisher: Prentice Hall; 2 edition (January 15, 2002)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0130322210
• ISBN-13: 978-0130322210
• Product Dimensions: 9.2 x 7 x 1.3 inches
• Shipping Weight: 2.8 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 3.0 out of 5 stars See all reviews (4 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #304,912 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

9 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars Worst book ever, January 14, 2003

By A Customer

If you already have a full understanding of networks and the algorithms associated with it, this is a good reference, maybe.

however if you are looking to learn about these topics this is not the book for you.

it is poorly written, with horrible examples which leave you wondering what exactly he is trying to explain. he jumps from topic to topic, not explaining some terms till many pages later. even after reading the chapter, trying to apply the ideas to the questions at the end is sometimes frustrating.

again this is only for someone as a refresher, not for someone trying to learn about the topic for the first time.

4.0 out of 5 stars High-Speed Networks and Internets: Performance and Quality of Service (2nd Edition), June 17, 2009

By	Gatsi Francis Agbeko - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

The book was delivered promptly and in good condition as advertised. The only thing I dislike about the book is that it was stamped as "used book" on all the three sides.

2.0 out of 5 stars Mostly superficial coverage of the material, July 21, 2008

By	Joshua Davies (Dallas, TX United States) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

I found this book mostly frustrating. Although it did contain some information that I've never encountered anywhere else (such as MPLS and diffserv), the writing style was so off-putting that it was hard to get through the material. The author seems to go out of his way, for example, to use the word "data" as a plural just to show off that he knows that data is a plural word. The sentence "the briefest of summaries if provided forthwith" pops up in the first chapter.

That said, I can't think of any competing book I could recommend that covers the same material. Unlike most every other networking book that's been published in the last 20 years or so, this book *doesn't* limit itself to TCP/IP, but covers frame relay and ATM and actually compares and contrasts the different approaches.

There's also sort of a "middle part" in chapters 7, 8 and 9 that cover probability, queuing theory and self-similarity. For the most part, these chapters are a waste of space, since they don't get into enough depth to cover the material and aren't really used much in the subsequent material.

Also, the exercises at the end of the chapters (all without answers and thus without any means of checking your work) generally can't be completed based on just the material in the chapter itself. In fact, I came across at least one exercise (the "chuck-a-luck" question in chapter 7) whose text was lifted verbatim from one of the chapter's references ("An Introduction to Probability" by Samuel Goldberg - which *does* include answers in the back of the book for self study).

So, although the author's research was impeccable, I have to say he really ought to have let somebody else do his writing for him.