Rate shaping in Active E FTTx networks

[Jason Lixfeld <jason () lixfeld ca>]

Hi all,

I'm trying to gauge what operators are doing to handle per-subscriber Internet access PIR bandwidth in Active E FTTx 
networks.  

I presume operators would want to limit the each subscriber to a certain PIR, but within that limit, do things like 
perform preferential treatment of interactive services like steaming video or Skype, etc., ahead of non-interactive 
services like FTP.

My impression is that a subscriber's physical access in these networks is exponentially larger than their allocated 
amount of Internet access.  This would leave ample room on the physical access access for other services like Voice and 
IPTV that might run on separate VLANs than the Internet access VLAN. That said, I doubt there's really that much of a 
concern about allocating PIR on these other service VLANs.

So in terms of PIR for Internet access, is there some magic box that sits between the various subscriber aggregation 
points and the core, which takes care of shaping the subscriber's Internet access PIR, while making sure that the any 
preferential treatment of interactive services is performed.

Is that a lot to ask for one box?  The ridiculously deep buffers required in order to shape to PIR vs. police to it 
(because policing to a PIR is just plain ugly) and the requirements to perform any sort of preferential packet 
treatment above and beyond that seem like quite a lot to ask of one box.  Am I wrong?

Who might make a box like this, if it exists?  And if not, what are folks using the achieve these results?

Thanks in advance for any insights..