QoS MEASUREMENTS IN CELULLAR NETWORKS

DATA AND VOICE

INTRODUCTION
}

Modern networks support traffic beyond the traditional data types, such as email, file sharing, or web traffic. Increasingly, data networks share a common medium with more sensitive forms of traffic, like voice and video..

As much higher data rates are being required and many more communication technologies become integrated, these sensitive traffic types often require guaranteed or regulated service.

Good reliability and availability of the services must be maintained.

INTRODUCTION

} } } } }

This paper looks at the metrics for measuring quality of service, Bottlenecks in the networks, Implementation of QoS. In Packet-Switched networks, And in Digital Television networks.

PACKET-SWITCHED NETWORKS

VoIP
}

VoIP (Voice-over-IP) refers to the transmission of voice using IP technologies over packet switched networks. VoIP transports voice packets as ordinary data, thus allowing the use of well-known supported techniques to control their flows in data networks. Voice requires low jitter, low delay and low loss. To withstand such needs, a certain level of QoS mechanism is needed.

} }

DEGRADATION FACTORS

Degradation factors comprise all influences in a network that negatively affect the quality of service.

Various factors have been identified in data networks and are the additional and application-specific sources of degradation.

DEGRADATION FACTORS

Delay Latency that occurs when traffic is sent end-end on a network.

Jitter Fragmentation that occurs when data arrives at irregular times and in the wrong order. It is therefore a measure of delay variance.

Packet loss Packet losses occur due to congestion in traffic, bandwidth limiting and datagram collisions among other factors.

ACCEPTED METRICS TO MEASURE QOS FOR NETWORK BASED SERVICES

}

Throughput the rate at which packets travel through the network. Maximum rate is always preferred. (maximize)

Delay the time taken for a packet to travel from one end to the other in a network. This has to be as low as possible. (minimize )

Packet loss rate the rate at which packets are dropped, lost or get corrupted while going through the network. (Minimize ).

Delay jitter the variation in delay encountered by similar packets following the same route in a network. (Minimize)

QoS METHODOLOGIES
} Integrated
} }

services(IntServ):

Based on resource reservation protocol(RSVP). Establishes QoS by providing end-end QoS guarantees by establishing a suitable path for every flow in the network.

Has four components: RSVP, Admission control , classifier and packet scheduler.

RSVP is a signaling protocol that signals for the network to reserve resources before transmission.

Admission control decides whether a request for resources can be granted.(high or low priority)

Classifier will identify then organize and put a packet in a queue according to service requirements.

Packet scheduler schedules packets so that they meet QoS requirements.

QoS METHODOLOGIES
} Differentiated
} }

services:

Diffserv splits the whole network into domains DS domain is a continuous set of nodes that support common resource policies and well defined boundaries.

Packets are classified and conditioned at entry to the network and assigned different DiffServ code points (DS bits).

Packets are conditioned by metering, marking, shaping and dropping.

DiffServ Packet Classification and Marking

}

Classification
}

Behavioral aggregate classification selects packets based on their DS code points. Multi-Field classifiers- selects packets based on values of multiple header fields.

Conditioning
} }

Traffic is classified to determine the class it belongs to. Packets are measured against the appropriate traffic profile from the TCA. Packets are marked by setting the DS value to a correct code point(6bits). Traffic is shaped by increasing the delay time and buffers the stream to make it compliant with the traffic profile. Packets may be dropped if the buffer limit is reached.

QoS MEASUREMENT ARCHITECTURE

A.

Single-point measurements

Round trip performance

terminal

network

server

logical application connection Measurement tool

Round trip (RT) performance this includes RT jitter, RT delay, RT packet loss

} }

Service response time Single point traffic statistics

QoS MEASUREMENT ARCHITECTURE

B. Two point measurements

End-to-end performance Uplink (UL) performance Downlink (DL) performance

Terminal

network
Logical application connection

server

Logical measurement tool connection Measurement tool Measurement tool

Common time reference (optional)

QoS MEASUREMENT ARCHITECTURE

C.

Multipoint measurements

Traffic is captured from various measurement points (MP) in the network

Network performance is divided into performances of network segments

QoS MEASUREMENT TOOLS

QoSMeT (VTT) is a passive tool for measuring one-way end-to-end network QoS from the applications point of view

QoS MEASUREMENT TOOLS

} }

Real-time measurements & accurate per packet statistics Is able to measure QoS of real-time applications (e.g., VoIP, video conferencing), but other networking applications can be measured as well.

The tool works practically over any kind of network as long as IP is supported

QoSMeT can be run in the same device with the measured application or within the network path at desired points

Measures e.g.: Delay, Jitter, Packet loss, Connection break duration (e.g., during a handover), Throughput and Offered load, and the volume of data sent/received

GPS is used for clock synchronization

DIGITAL TELEVISION NETWORKS (DVB T/H)

}

ITU-T Recommendation E.800 defines QoS as The collective effect of service performance, which determines the degree of satisfaction of a user of the service.

Therefore, the quality of the service being offered will depend on the perception of each user of that service.

A set of parameters and their values have to be defined against which the performance of the service can be evaluated.

These values have to be met to ensure a proper function of the system and a good quality of service for the end-user, i.e. the values should always remain above the threshold value by a certain margin.

DVB-T/H RELATED QoS REQIUREMENTS

Input

program
IP1

Video/audio coders and multiplexer

MPEG-Decoder

TS1

Modulator

RF1

Demodulator

TS2

IP2
MFER FER

DVB-T/H Chain

QoS REQUIREMENTS AT IP1 AND IP2

} Service
}

bit rate

This is measured at IP1 and IP2, this measurement evaluates the bit rate of the service (e.g. video, Audio) including the UDP, IP and TP header.

For QoS to be achieved, the service bit rate should remain within a pre-defined band around a pre-defined nominal value, e.g. 256kbps +/- 4% or 4.0 Mbps +/- 100kbps.

Input

program
IP1

Video/audio coders and multiplexer

MPEG-Decoder

IP2
MFER FER

QoS REQUIREMENTS AT IP1 AND IP2

IP packet error rate

}

Measured at IP1 and IP2, this parameter shows the number of corrupted IP packets vs. the number of all IP packets. To ensure QoS, the IP packet error rate at IP1 should be very low and at IP2 certain degradation factors have to be taken into account.

The threshold at both points is determined by the service bit rate and the acceptable probability of visual distortions. E.g. 10-6 (for 4Mbps this translates to roughly 1 visible artifact per hour)

At IP2: 3*10-5 (at the end-user terminal, higher IP packet error rates are acceptable, e.g. 1 visible artifact every 2 minutes)

QoS REQUIREMENTS AT IP1 AND IP2

} IP
}

packet jitter
IP packet jitter is the variation in delay of the arrival of the IP packet.

At IP1 i.e. the input of the encoder jitter is not normally very critical because of the buffering process in the encoder.

At IP2, the jitter should be very minimal as it can cause problems in the receiver buffer management, for example a peak-to peak value of less than 120ms at IP1 and less than 40ms at IP2.
Video/audio coders and multiplexer MPEG-Decoder

Input

program
IP1

IP2
MFER FER

QoS REQUIREMENTS AT TS1 AND TS2

} TS
} } }

synchronization loss
TS_sync_loss is the loss of the MPEG-2 transport stream. the input to the modulator at TS1 should be long term stable any loss in synchronization is a severe problem and should be attended to promptly At TS2 loss of synchronization is indicative of lack of coverage for the receiver in a mobile environment*. At TS1 the loss of synchronization of once per month is acceptable, while at TS2 no loss of synchronization should be experienced as long as the receiver is within the nominal coverage area.
MPEG-Decoder

TS1

Modulator

TS2

MFER

FER

QoS REQUIREMENTS AT TS1 AND TS2

} Sync
} }

bite error

Sync_bite_error is measured at TS1 and TS2, Sync_ byte _error occurs when content of sync byte in TS header is not equal to 0x47.

The correct spacing between sync bites should be checked at TS1 to avoid synchronization problems in the receiver.
MPEG-Decoder

TS1

Modulator

TS2

MFER

FER

QoS REQUIREMENTS AT TS1 AND TS2

}

BER
} }

Bit error rate is measured at TS2. BER before RS (Reed-Solomon) or LDPC (Low density parity check) in DVB-T2 can be measured quickly and gives a good overview of BER after RS or LPDC coding in a receiver. A BER of around 10-4 before Reed-Solomon is usually assumed to give "Quasi-Error-Free" (QEF) performance after Reed Solomon. To maintain QoS, a low BER of the order of 10-4 before coding must be used to obtain an acceptable level of visible distortion.
MPEG-Decoder
TS2

MFER

FER

QoS REQUIREMENTS FOR RF1 AND RF2

} RF
}

Level

Points RF1 and RF2 are measurement points for the RF/IF signal power. The RF power level is measured as the power of DVB-T/H signal within the nominal channel bandwidth. At RF1, the RF level must be within a narrow tolerance of the specified transmitter output level. At RF2, the RF level should be above the minimum input level of the receiver frontend by a certain margin; the minimum input level required by the receiver to produce a data stream with a BER below a pre-defined threshold, depends on the selected transmission mode and the channel conditions including the speed with which the receiver is moved.

QoS REQUIREMENTS FOR RF1 AND RF2

} MER
}

Modulation Error ratio (MER) provides a single "figure of merit" analysis of the modulated signal.

It includes various signal degradations such as noise, amplitude imbalance, quadrature error and residual errors.

} }

MER determines how much margin the system has before failure. At RF1, MER gives a good overview of the quality of the transmitter output signal; RF2, the MER measurement can help identifying potential problems in the receiver. As a rule of thumb, an MER value of 32dB should be used for 256 QAM.

End of slide
Cedric Nshimba