Tektronix Solutions for IPTV Network Test

Next-generation networks based on IP are enabling the delivery of “infotainment services” of interactive data, voice, video, and audio. These new services place great demands on broadband networks, where each of the services has it’s own unique technical, commercial and user-experience requirements. IPTV users will expect an experience equal to or better than their current TV experience. Anything less will be unacceptable and could lead to rejection of the services and increase the customers churn for networks operators. As a result, Quality of Service (QoS) is a vital component to the way the video services are handled within the network.

Quality of Service for video services requires the following:

• Bandwidth – High availability and sufficient guaranteed bandwidth to allow the successful delivery of the service.
• Short Transmission Delay – Transmission delay through the network impacts quality of experience for the user as it effects the response time to requests from the remote control.
• Low Network Jitter – Jitter affects the variability of packet arrival through the network. This variability can lead to buffer underflows and overflows at the receiving STB. This can impact the way packets are handled at various network elements. If the jitter is too high, packet loss will increase as queuing software tries to load balance traffic at network elements.
• Low Packet Loss – Lost packets has the greatest impact on the quality of received video and will generally lead to highly visible blocking errors and reduced customer satisfaction.