On playback delay in streaming communication

Abstract

We consider the problem of minimizing playback delay in streaming over a packet erasure channel with fixed bandwidth. When packets have to be played in order, the expected delay inherently grows with time. We analyze two cases, namely no feedback and instantaneous feedback. We find that in both cases the delay grows logarithmically with the time elapsed since the start of transmission, and we evaluate the growth constant, i.e. the pre-log term, as a function of the transmission bandwidth (relative to the source bandwidth). The growth constant with feedback is strictly better that the one without, but they have the same asymptotic value in the limit of infinite bandwidth.