VIDEO CONFERENCING

Transmission Control Protocol/Internet Protocol or as known as TCP/IP is a protocol suite

which is made up of interactive modules. Consists of five layers now; physical, data, link,
network, transport and application.

How videoconferencing works in terms of TCP/IP protocol stack:

TCP/IP is Transmission Control Protocol/Internet Protocol which transmits
information packet by packet and able to identify and make error corrections. It is a reliable
protocol designed for transmitting alphanumeric data plus it can stop and correct itself when
data is lost. TCP/IP is used to guarantee sequenced, error-free transmission, but its very
nature can cause delays and reduced throughput. This can be annoying, especially with audio.
The video conferencing use this TCP/IP because of the network connectivity is ubiquitous
which can be present everywhere at once and it is relatively low in price. Due to the fact that
video conferencing is a real time application, the changes or errors in data rate will affect the
video signal which will result in delay of the application. A really good bandwidth is needed
to make the video conferencing possible.

Before encoding the analog information encoded to a digital signal and compressed,
the information is recorded by a microphone and camera. This compressed data will be
transported over a network after it has been divided into data packets. To make Multipoint
conference happen in a videoconferencing over a TCP/IP network, a Multipoint Conference
Server (MCS) is required which is also known as an H.323 Multipoint Control Unit (H.323
MCU). This is an addition to basic IP technology in order to provide a continuous
transmission.

Before we start, it is good to have an understanding of what types of networks are available
since they all have strengths and weaknesses that should be considered carefully before
deciding upon which to use. The diagram below shows the networks, infrastructure and
devices used in H.323, SIP and H.320 standards based videoconferencing.

In transport layer which handles the data delivery between distributed applications across
network, it is divided into two types; TCP & UDP. TCP stands for transmission control
protocol whereas UDP stands for user datagram protocol.
TCP

UDP

Reliable

Unreliable

Emphasizes on reliability

Emphasizes on speed

Since real time packets must arrive in a timely manner, therefore clearly it is not possible to
use TCP for videoconferencing as we need to send data in a very high speed to prevent it
from lagging since it emphasizes on reliability and not speed. Usually, videoconferencing
uses UDP instead because they emphasizes on the speed. Furthermore, since UDP is a

client/server program, it suits for videoconferencing. In conclusion, TCP can be used in

videoconferencing but not preferable because it may causes delays compared to using UDP in
videoconferencing.

REFERENCES
http://www.bambooav.com/information-about-videoconferencing.html
http://www.c21video.com/whitepapers/what_to_know_about_video_conferencing.html
http://www.wcsu.edu/technology/telecomm/videoconferencing.asp
http://ntszgrs.altervista.org/how-does-video-conferencing-work/
http://www.wa-k20.net/faq.php?page=4b6&rn0=on&sn3=on
http://ntszgrs.altervista.org/how-does-video-conferencing-work/
https://community.jisc.ac.uk/library/janet-services-documentation/nat-firewalls-andvideoconferencing-h323-border-traversals
http://lsntap.org/node/963