An efficient deterministic bandwidth allocation method in interactive video-on-demand systems

An interactive video-on-demand (IVOD) system requires continuous video playback, and network bandwidth should be allocated to satisfy quality of service (QOS) requirements. Bandwidth allocation methods can be classified into two categories: static and dynamic. There are two types of static allocation methods: deterministic and statistical. In deterministic allocation, bandwidth which provides deterministic QOS is allocated only at call setup time. Although the implementation is simpler than other methods, it suffers from low bandwidth utilization. In this paper, we propose a new deterministic static bandwidth allocation method which improves bandwidth utilization. This method does not require set-top box (STB) control. This decreases the STB cost and the signalling overhead in the network.