Abstract— Television is now changing its traditional distribution forms to being distributed digitally over broadband networks. The recent development of broadband Internet connectivity has made the transition to Internet Protocol Television (IPTV) possible. When changing distribution technique of an existing service, it is important that the new technique does not make the service worse from the user`s point of view. Although a broadband network offers high capacity and has excellent performance there will be occasional packet losses and delays which could negatively influence the user experience of the delivered broadband service. In this paper we studied and investigated the performance of IPTV in term of send and receive packet as well as delay factor. Keywords: IPTV, VoD, STB, HDTV, Simulation.

I. INTRODUCTION

Over the last fifteen years there have been continuous developments associated with the Internet. More people have gained Internet access as well as making use of the services offered. The increasing number of new users and services offered has caused a surge for connections with high bandwidth, low delay, and high reliability. This type of network connections called broadband connections, have increased greatly in numbers over the years. The increased capacity in the network allow for new and exciting services. Streaming media is one such group of services that has grown rapidly growing over the last few years. Internet Protocol Television (IPTV) is a specific example. IPTV specifies a group of multimedia services including, live-TV, Video on Demand, and Pay-per view. Multimedia services such as IPTV rely heavily on streaming video techniques[1]. For a streaming video service to be at all feasible, it must utilize compression techniques in order to reduce the amount of data being transmitted. Modern compression techniques utilize predictive coding which makes the stream sensitive to information loss. Since streaming video is a real-time service it is also sensitive to information being delayed or received out of order. Some of the current deployments of IPTV suffer from slow channel change performance. This is in some part due to the long waiting time for the decoder to find a suitable starting point in the new stream. In summation, IPTV distribution requires a high performance network infrastructure, information loss probabilities and network delay variance needs to be very low otherwise the service will not function properly. Television via Internet Protocol (IP television or IPTV) is a new emerging way of distrusting digital television[2]. IP television is a cable

transmission system in the sense that it utilizes a physical cable connection between broadcasters and customers, but there are important differences between IP television and traditional cable systems. Cable systems devote a certain bandwidth each channel, and cablecast them all out simultaneously, while IP television uses "switched video" architecture to send out only one channel at a time. Video content transmitted in an IP television network can be on demand, allowing consumers to choose what program he or she wants to watch at any time, or follow traditional on-air programming. A media server transmits the television signal through core and access networks to a broadband modem figure 1. A router distributes the signal from the modem to the appropriate viewing device in each home. This might a PC, an IP television or a standard television set connected to a set-top box [3][4].

Figure.1, IP Network

Evaluate the performance of Internet Protocol Television

Dr.Ibrahim Khider, Dr.Salah Elfaki, MOHAMED ELHASSAN, MONA SIDDIGDept of Electronic Engineering

Sudan University of Science and Technology sudan-khartoum

E_Mail: Ibrahim_khider@hotmail.com

5902978-1-4244-8164-4/11/$26.00 ©2011 IEEE

II. THE MODEL OF IP TV

The IPTV head-end is where content (such as television channels or Video on Demand movies) is received and prepared for transmission across the operator's private IP network. In this model the head end represented by TV station and Server station. The network backbone is an often overlooked piece of enabling IPTV services. The backbone must be addressed by service providers in this case we have a data cloud network. The most basic decision about the access network is figuring out how much of the existing copper loop can be used. The general guideline for offering IPTV service is that the network must support at least 20 Mbps for long-term viability of a service offering that includes HDTV service. Finally the subscriber's premise is often the most costly portion of the overall solution. Each site requires a demarcation device such as a DSL modem.The parts of the model shown in figure.2.

Figure.2, IPTV Model

III. SIMULATION DESCRIPTION

We are going to make a simulation using Opnet[5] for a small network that represent the IPTV network which consist of two sources (TV Station and Server Station) keeping in our minds the following parameters: - Traffic sent (packet/sec),Traffic sent (bytes/sec),Traffic received (packet/sec),Traffic received (bytes/sec),Packet End-to-End delay (sec) and Packet Delay Variation. The main goal of this simulation is to study the results of the above parameters to get the high performance results of the system and the through put of the overall network. The duration of the simulation is about 10 minutes for the small network which shown in figure.3.

Simulation Parameters (i) TV Station: Symbol: High Resolution Video. Frame Interarrival Time Information = 15 frames/sec. Frame Size Information = 128× 240 pixels. Symbolic Destination Name = Video Destination. Type of Service = Best Effort. (ii) Server Station: Symbol: Low Resolution Video. Frame Interarrival Time Information = 10 frames/sec. Frame Size Information = 128× 120 pixels. Symbolic Destination Name = Video Destination. Type of Service = Best Effort.

Figure .3, IPTV simulation area

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IV. RESULTS AND DISCUSSION

Figure.4 shows the average traffic sent packets/sec which show that there are 150 packets sent per second. As shown at the beginning of the simulation no packets were sent and this was happened at the first minute of the simulation and after that the packet sent increased rapidly until it become remains for the rest of the simulation time in about 150 packets per second. Figure.5 shows the average traffic sent bytes/sec which show that there are more than 4,000,000 bytes sent per second. As happened above at the beginning of the simulation no bytes were sent and this was happened at the first minute of the simulation and after that the bytes sent increased rapidly until it become remains for the rest of the simulation time in about 4,000,0000 bytes per second. Figure.6 shows the average received packets/sec which show that there are nearly 150 packets received per second. Because the sent and received packets is synchronized, no packets was received at the beginning of the simulation(first minute) and then the packets received increased until it reached about 150 packets/sec as happened in the transmit side. Figure.7 shows the average received bytes/sec which shows that there are nearly 4,000,000 bytes per second. Similarly the sent and received bytes is synchronized, no bytes was received at the beginning of the simulation(first minute) and then the bytes received increased until it reached about 4,000,000 bytes/sec as happened in the transmit side. Figure.8, shows the packet end-to-end delay which show that there is 0.003 of delay. And as we observe no delay in the first minute because there is no action, and then the delay begin with 0.0025 until it reached 0.0030 sec. Figure.9, shows the average packet delay variation which show that the delay variation is about 0.000001 sec. As figure shows the delay is varied, it begin by 0.000008 then it increased to 0.0000015 then it decreased gradually until it reached 0.000006 with average of about 0.000001.

Figure.4, The traffic sent (packets/sec)

Figure.5, average traffic sent (bytes/sec)

Figure.6, the traffic received (packets/sec)

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Figure.7, average traffic received (bytes/sec)

Figure.8, The packet end-to-end delay

Figure.9, The packet delay variation

V. CONCLUSION

In this small network we notice that over 150 packets sent in one second there is a packets delay or dropped to resent again, otherwise it freeze, all this slow down the system. Also available bandwidth and data rates also vary among DSL in the system. In general the real advantage of IPTV is that it uses Internet protocols to provide two-way communication for interactive television. One of the advantages of IPTV is the ability for digital video recorders (DVRs) to record multiple broadcasts at once. It is also be easier to find favorite programs by using "custom view guides." IPTV even allows for picture-in-picture viewing without the need for multiple tuners. You can watch one show, while using picture-in-picture to channel surf.

REFERENCES

1. http://www.wikipedia.com 2. A. Yarali and A. Cherry, “Internet protocol television

(IPTV),” in TENCON 2005 2005 IEEE Region 10, November 2005, pp. 1 – 6.

3. P. Pfeffer, “IPTV: Technology and development predictions,” Fiber and Integrated Optics, vol. 25, no. 5, pp. 325–246, September-October 2006.

4. http://www.ipapplication.com 5. Opnet IT Guru manuals.

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