Improving Performance for Streaming Video Services over CDMA-Based Wireless Networks

In video streaming services, the playout begins when the queue length of the receiver buffer is above a threshold. This threshold must be large to reduce the buffer underflow probability and absorb the bit rate variations caused by the wireless channel. On the other hand, it is important to reduce this threshold in order to reduce the initial playout delay and also the size of the receiver buffer. In this paper, a video streaming service is considered, where the last link is a wireless CDMA-based link and it has been shown how a truncated power control allows to reduce the pre-roll delay without increasing the average transmission power and without degrading the video quality. The paper presents the proposed truncated power control and an analytical model to evaluate the achievable pre-roll delay reduction. Also the advantages in terms of video quality are shown. Keywords— ARQ mechanism, code division multiple access, truncated power control, video quality, wireless video streaming.