ABSTRACT
Contents 5.1 Introduction ................................................................................................................... 136 5.2 IPTV on the Rise ........................................................................................................... 137 5.3 IPTV Architecture ......................................................................................................... 138
5.3.1 Media Encoding and Compression ..................................................................... 138 5.3.2 Protocols Utilized in IPTV ................................................................................. 140
5.3.2.1 IGMP ................................................................................................... 140 5.3.2.2 Transfer Protocols ................................................................................. 141 5.3.2.3 Multicast Routing and Forwarding ...................................................... 141
5.4 Standardization Landscape ............................................................................................ 142 5.5 Wired and Wireless IPTV Networks .............................................................................. 145
5.5.1 Wired.................................................................................................................. 145 5.5.2 Wireless .............................................................................................................. 146 5.5.3 In-Home Networking ......................................................................................... 147
5.6 Measuring Performance of IPTV ................................................................................... 148 5.6.1 Network Performance Metrics ............................................................................ 148
5.6.1.1 Packet Loss ........................................................................................... 148 5.6.1.2 One-Way Propagation Delay ................................................................ 150 5.6.1.3 Packet Delay Variation ......................................................................... 150 5.6.1.4 Out-of-Order and Reordered Packets.................................................... 150
5.6.2 QoE Metrics ....................................................................................................... 150 5.6.2.1 MOS and R-Factor ............................................................................... 150 5.6.2.2 MDI ..................................................................................................... 152
5.6.3 IGMP and IPTV Service-Specific Metrics .......................................................... 152 5.6.4 Quality Margins for IPTV Services .................................................................... 154 5.6.5 Direct, Active, and Passive Measurements .......................................................... 156
5.1 Introduction Over 30 years ago, networking experts from military and educational environments introduced Transmission Control Protocol (TCP)/Internet Protocol (IP), giving birth to packet-switched networks to circumvent any single point of failure, which is common in circuit-switched networks such as public switched telephone networks (PSTNs). e design of this new network type had been governed with one and only concept: best-effort data delivery. By this, it was implied that the network would make its best attempt to transfer data, yet no guarantee about that could be given and early applications of this scheme such as HTTP and email needed nothing more. In the recent past though, a variety of other applications have been developed, the use of which has become (or is gradually becoming) quite popular, such as IP Television (IPTV), which is the newest hot topic in computer networks.
