Testing 3G Video Streaming Standards

The International Multimedia Telecommunications Consortium's Packet-switched Streaming Services Activity Group (PSS-AG) staged a live face-to-face interoperability test event in June, kicking off its latest cycle of interoperability testing of 3GPP and 3GPP2 mobile phone streaming standards. The PSS-AG is focused on testing the interoperability of features from the latest 3G multimedia streaming specifications, including streaming bit-rate adaptation, multi-track signaling, and progressive download of the latest codecs including H.264 Video and Enhanced aacPlus Audio.

The face-to-face kick-off event was hosted by RealNetworks in Seattle. Thirty-two people, representing 13 member companies, participated in the event. Testing was conducted using commercially available 2.5 and 3G cellular networks in addition to local area wired and wireless networks instrumented to simulate network congestion.

"The PSS-AG is an active and highly collaborative group of industry leaders working together to solve interoperability problems and to enable features ahead of the market," said Ralph Neff, co-chairman of the PSS-AG and senior member of technical staff at PacketVideo.

"New features such as rate adaptation, where streaming quality is optimized to changing network conditions, cannot be deployed without extensive interoperability testing," said Amir Wolf, co-chairman of PSS-AG and IMTC Fellow. "This is the essential role that our group provides for the industry."

The current test cycle is expected to continue throughout the year, culminating in a second live test event at the end of 2006. Other companies are welcome to join the PSS-AG and to participate in the ongoing tests."

Posted to the site on 20th July 2006