Integrated multimedia network system

Claim 1

An integrated multimedia network system comprising: a transmission path formed by at least a single transmission loop; and a plurality of transport nodes intervened at arbitrary locations of said transmission path and each having several types of communication media for transmitting and receiving of communication information; said transport nodes each including, information/packet converting means, provided for each of said communication media, for exchanging said communication information from said communication media in a fixed-length packet transfer format, packet switching means for receiving packets converted by said information/packet converting means and packets from an adjoining transport node, dividing said packets into plural groups for at least self node and other nodes by packet switching based on header information indicating destinations of said packets, and sending that group of packets which is destined to said self node to associated information/packet converting means, transmission means for multiplexing, on a time-divisional basis, those groups of packets which are destined to said other nodes and sending said packets on said transmission path, receiving means for receiving a time-divided multiplexing signal sent via said transmission path from an adjoining transport node and time divisionally separating said time-shade multiplexing signal group by group and sending a resulting signal to said packet switching means; wherein said packet switching means comprises first switching means and second switching means, said first switching means receives packets transmitted from said information/packet converting means and packets from said second switching means, divides said packets into plural groups for at least self node and other nodes by packet switching based on header information indicating destinations of said packets, sends those groups of packets which are destined to said other nodes to said second switching means, and sends that group of packets which is destined to said self node to said information/packet converting means, and said second switching means received a group of packets from said first switching means and a group of packets from said receiving means, sequentially extracts packets from each group, separating said packets into plural groups for at least said self node and said other nodes by packet switching based on said header information indicating destinations, sends those groups of packets which are destined to said other nodes to said transmission means, and sends that group of packets which is destined to said self node to said first switching means.