
Originally Posted by
PsychoFish
MSAN is in the simplest explanation possible an upgrade from a DSLAM. The way the older exchanges work is that you would have one device that deals with POTS, one DSLAM (for xDSL), one for ISDN, etc etc ect. The MSAN (multi-service access node) essentially combines the POTS, DSLAM and ISDN connectivity types into a single platform/device.
This basically allows for them to ultimately roll out FTTx, xDSL, POTS and ISDN services from a single device and allows them to have much greater density while maintaining the same physical footprint.