Ofer Hadar

Rapid advantages in computer and telecommunication technologies have made integrated services packet-switched networks possible. It is expected that a significant portion of future networks will carry prerecorded video. Traffic in applications such as Video on Demand (VoD), will include high-fidelity audio, short multimedia clips, and full-length movies. In this paper we study the effect of video rate smoothing of a prerecorded VBR sources, on network utilization and statistical multiplexing gain, such that the end users receive satisfactory service. The enhancement piecewise constant rate transmission and transport (e-PCRTT) algorithm is used as the smoothing algorithm which utilizes equal size intervals and its effect on the statistical characteristics of the multiplexed video is explored. We found that synchronization between the smoothing intervals can significantly improve the efficiency of the smoothing process by reducing the number of bandwidth changes and the rate variability of the multiplexed stream. We investigate how synchronized smoothing intervals influence the potential for statistical gain, as compared to unsynchronized streams and present several examples to illustrate the advantage of synchronized streams over unsynchronized streams.