Improving H.264 real-time streaming in MANETs through adaptive multipath routing techniques

One of the main problems associated with MANETs is that mobility and the associated route discovery and maintenance procedures of reactive routing protocols cause interruptions on real-time video streams. Some of these interruptions are too large to be concealed using any sort of video technology, resulting in communications breaks unpleasant for the final end user. We present a solution for enhanced video transmission that increases route stability by using an improved route discovery process based on the DSR routing protocol, along with traffic splitting algorithms and a preventive route discovery mechanism. We also present a tuning methodology for an H.264 video codec in order to obtain optimal interaction with the underlying mechanisms proposed. Combining our proposals, we achieve up to 97% less interruptions on communication with high mobility, and over 1.2 dB of improvements in terms of video distortion.