Improving Video Quality in Network Paths with Bursty Losses

This paper presents a method to improve video quality at the receiver side of a streaming service when the network path presents losses in bursts. Technologies that aggregate packets into larger switched data units are typical scenarios for this kind of loss behavior. Optical Burst Switched (OBS) networks and Optical Packet Switched (OPS) networks are examples of such technologies. Video quality is evaluated by means of a no reference video quality metric (the Frame Starvation Ratio). Results show that using video frame classification at the edge node and service differentiation at the network, the playback quality can be substantially improved.