Topic 3, Switching 5 The diagram (Fig3.51 of R&S ed 1, 3.66 ed 2) shows a crossbar switch constructed in a planar geometry.

Each individual switch is a 2x2 switch and they are connected with optical waveguides grown on the substrate. One of the main advantages of this design is that the waveguides do not cross each other, this can help improve the optical crosstalk performance. Although this switch is wide-sense non-blocking there are a number of drawbacks in this construction. Each path goes through a different number of switches and hence the overall insertion loss is different for each input-output pair. The path length also depends on the input-output pair. This is perhaps less crucial than the loss problem. This would be important in an application where parallel data is being transmitted on several lines. The variable path length results in clock skew . Planar Crossbar Can be integrated on planar substrate No waveguide crossovers Variable path loss Variable path length