Principle (Diminishing Return to Buffering): The increase in throughput from adding a unit of buffer space at a station in a closed line decreases as the size of the buffer increases.
As we have seen in the buffering
principle, adding buffer space increases throughput. However,
this does not continue indefinitely. The diminishing returns to buffering
principle states that the benefits of additional buffer spaces will decrease
as the size of the buffers grow. This is an example of the general principle
of diminishing returns. It occurs because the mechanism by which buffering
increases throughput is by reducing the amount of blocking and starving
of the bottleneck. However, the larger the buffers become, the less
frequently blocking and starving occur. Hence, the opportunity for
improvement decreases. Eventually, when the buffers get sufficiently
large, no further improvement is possible and hence the performance of
the system approaches that of the infinite
buffer closed line.