Black Box Explains...DS-3 and DS-4

Digital signal (DS) speeds are used to classify the capacities of lines and trunks as designated by the Trunk (T) carrier systems. The most well-known T carrier system is the North American T1 standard, which was originally designed to transmit digitized voice signals at 1.544 Mbps (DS-1). T carrier systems now carry digital data as well as voice transmissions.

DS-3 lines offer the functional equivalent of 28 T1 channels, operating at 44.736 Mbps (commonly rounded up to 45 Mbps). These lines handle up to 672 voice conversations and are used in high-speed interconnect and DS cross-connect (DSX) applications.

DS-4 offers 274.176 Mbps transmission—the same as 4032 standard voice channels—and has 168 times the capacity of T1. This performance level is generally used for carrier backbone networks.

Products offering DS-3 and DS-4 functionality comply with T3 and T4 standards, respectively, and with Bellcore GR-139-CORE specifications.