ATM network impairment to video quality
Alfred Ching Hong Wong · Open University of Cape Town (University of Cape Town) · 2000
Multimedia applications have begun to receive more and more attention since the 1990's.With the help of computer networking, multimedia technology allows individuals to retrieve information and to communicate visually and orally with one another.At this point in time, applications such as distance learning, video-on-demand and video-conferencing are already on the market.When these services are deployed by public service providers, it is important to consider issues.such as infrastructure and bandwidth requirements, how these services will be charged, the quality of service expected by the general public, the network performance requirements etc.In general, users are more concerned with the quality of multimedia communication applications than the technologies that have enabled them.If the quality of these services is not satisfactory, it is very unlikely that they will attract many users or generate much revenue.This study considers video traffic over ATM networks and investigates the effects of network impairments on the quality of video presented to end-users.A network impairment emulation architecture is developed and implemented in the form of an emulated ATM network.The video and audio distortions caused by ATM network impairments are investigated and an attempt is made to quantify the amount of degradation in video quality resulting from such distortions.The results presented in this research not only reveal how video traffic is impaired by ATM networks, but also provide the fundamentals to determine network performance requirements for supporting video communications.