Targeted performance goals

The charts shown below outline performance goals for a typical network. Specific system requirements may require
tighter or less critical performance.
DTS-330: The only one-box solutions for MPEG, DVB and ATSC testing
- Performs real time analysis, evaluation, and troubleshooting to maintain the
highest level of QoS
- Includes a wide range of standard interfaces: ASI, SPI, SMPTE-310M, COFDM,
8VSB, QPSK, GigE, and QAM
- Allows for flexibility of all required interfaces, mobility and remote troubleshooting
- New! MPEG-4 analysis capabilities
To learn more, call 1-866-ACTERNA or e-mail cable.info@acterna.com.
For all the details, please visit www.acterna.com/tripleplay.
When ensuring the quality of your Digital TV service is of the utmost importance
You can depend on Acterna.
Cable Modem Termination System (CMTS)
A PCMM-capable CMTS is a generalized version of the PacketCable 1.x CMTS that is also responsible for fulfilling
QoS requests received from one or more Policy Servers. It performs this function by installing Gates, which enable the
customers cable modem to request network resources from the CMTS through the creation of dynamic DOCSIS flows
with guaranteed levels of QoS. The CMTS also sends event messages detailing actual usage of QoS resources to the
Record Keeping Server.
Policy Server (PS)
The PS, situated between the Application Manager (AM) and the CMTS, simultaneously plays a dual role as a
proxy for AM-initiated session requests and a sentry for defining and enforcing Resource Control Domain policy.
This element also serves as a Policy Decision Point (PDP) in relation to the CMTS in that the PS implements MSO-
defined authorization and recourse-management procedures. Conversely, the PS plays the role of Policy Enforcement
Point (PEP) in relation to the Application Manager as it proxies Gate Control messages to and from the CMTS. There
are two basic classes of Policy Servers: Stateful and Stateless.
MERand BER
When it comes to testing digital QAM
signals, testing experts suggest that cable net-
work operators use their digital video analyz-
ers to test both Modulation Error Ratio (MER)
and Bit Error Rate (BER). Thats because
MER and BER measurements detect different
types of impairments.
MER is the measurement in dB of the RMS
error magnitude over the average symbol
magnitude. The higher the error magnitude,
the poorer the MER. MER essentially assigns a value to the fuzziness of
the symbol cluster (see Figure 1). So, the larger or fuzzier the cluster
becomes, the poorer the MER. Likewise, the farther the dots move from
their ideal locations, the poorer the MER.
For example, the diagram shown in Figure 2 is a constellation with a
good MER of 34 dB, while the diagram on the right (Figure 3) shows a
constellation with a poor MER of 21 dB.
Each symbol, or dot, on the
constellation is framed by deci-
sion boundaries (see Figure 4).
When the carrier falls inside the
boundaries, the information is
transmitted without errors. In
this example, BER testing is not an effective measurement because the BER is
perfect. But the good news could be hiding problems.
Using MER instead, it is clear that while each of the following constellations
have a perfect BER, the constellation in Figure 7 has a much better MER, with
less noise (see Figures 5, 6 and 7).
So, why measure BER? Because MER is a poor indicator of fast, intermittent
transients. Examples of these types of impairments include laser clipping (the
most common cause), loose or corroded connections, sweep system interference and microphonics. So, if you have high
MER, but errors are present, they are probably being caused by intermittent interference. This shows up on a constellation
diagram as a lone dot that is away from the main cluster.
Figure 1
Figure 3. Constellation with poor MER
-7 -5 -3 -1
-1
-3
-5
-7
1
Correct locations fall
within decision
boundaries
Locations in error fall out
of decision boundaries
-7 -5 -3 -1
-1
-3
-5
-7
1 3 5 7
Poor MER
Perfect BER
Figure 2. Constellation with good MER
P.O. Box 266007, Highlands Ranch, CO 80163-6007
CED magazine, August 2005 www.cedmagazine.com
Tel.: 303-470-4800 Fax: 303-470-4890
PacketCable Multimedia architecture and Digital TV testing
Figure 5
-7 -5 -3 -1
-1
-3
-5
-7
1 3
Good MER
Perfect BER
Figure 6
-7 -5 -3 -1
-1
-3
-5
-7
1 3 5 7
Best MER
Perfect BER
Figure 7
Figure 4

The digital video world is much more complicated than

its analog predecessor. To perform proper testing and mon-
itoring on the digital signal, technicians and engineers must
look within the physical layer to the underlying MPEG
transport layer to view how the signal is being encapsulated.
The physical layer must be up and running for everything
else to work, but only looking at the physical layer does not
provide much data about the underlying layers and the
applications that are running there. Without testing the
underlying MPEG layer, problems that could be missed
include audio/video ES timing errors, excessive PCR jitter
(which could cause loss of picture), missing PSI/SI tables
and PIDS, as well as low bit-rate of PIDs, which could
degrade the picture.
ES = Elementary Stream
Looking beyond
the physical layer
64/256
QAM
RF
signal
MPEG
single/multi
program
transport
stream
Program
Program
Program
Video ES
Audio ES
Video ES
Audio ES
Video ES
Audio ES
How good should it be?
Without a view beyond the physical layer, there is no way to
tell whats happening inside the haystack.
Application
manager
Record
keeping server
Client
Cable
modem
CMTS Policy server
MSO managed
IP network
Application
manager
Record
keeping server
Client
pkt-mm-1
pkt-mm-6 mm-9
mm-10
pkt-mm-2
p
k
t
-m
m
-3
p
k
t
-m
m
-5
m
m
-7
m
m
-8
p
k
t
-m
m
-4
Cable
modem
CMTS Policy server
MSO managed
IP network
64 QAM 256 QAM
Excellent 35 dB 35 dB 0.0 E-00 0.0 E-00
Acceptable 34 dB 35 dB 0.0 E-00 0.0E+00
Marginal 32 dB 34 dB 1.0E-08 1.0E-09
Excellent 35 dB 35 dB 0.0 E-00 0.0 E-00
Acceptable 33 dB 34 dB 1.0E-09 0.0 E-00
Marginal 30 dB 32 dB 1.0E-08 1.0E-09
Excellent 33 dB 35 dB 1.0E-09 0.0 E-00
Acceptable 31 dB 33 dB 1.0E-08 0.0 E-00
Marginal 28 dB 30 dB 1.0E-07 1.0E-09
Excellent 33 dB 35 dB 1.0E-08 0.0 E-00
Acceptable 29 dB 32 dB 1.0E-07 1.0E-09
Marginal 25 dB 30 dB 1.0E-06 1.0E-08
Excellent 32 dB 35 dB 1.0E-08 0.0 E-0
Acceptable 28 dB 32 dB 1.0E-07 1.0E-08
Marginal 25 dB 28 dB 1.0E-06 1.0E-07
N
o
d
e
A
m
p
M
o
d
e
m
H
e
a
d
e
n
d
Digital data
Pre FEC
BER
Post FEC
BER
MER
64 QAM 256 QAM
Excellent 35 dB 35 dB 0.0 E-00 0.0 E-00
Acceptable 33 dB 35 dB 1.0E-08 0.0E+00
Marginal 30 dB 32 dB 1.0E-07 1.0E-08
Excellent 34 dB 35 dB 0.0 E-00 0.0 E-00
Acceptable 31 dB 34 dB 1.0E-08 0.0 E-00
Marginal 28 dB 30 dB 1.0E-07 1.0E-08
Excellent 33 dB 35 dB 1.0E-09 0.0 E-00
Acceptable 30 dB 32 dB 1.0E-08 1.0E-09
Marginal 25 dB 27 dB 1.0E-07 1.0E-08
Excellent 32 dB 35 dB 1.0E-08 0.0 E-00
Acceptable 28 dB 31 dB 1.0E-07 1.0E-09
Marginal 24 dB 28 dB 1.0E-06 1.0E-08
Excellent 32 dB 35 dB 1.0E-08 0.0 E-0
Acceptable 27 dB 31 dB 1.0E-07 1.0E-08
Marginal 23 dB 27 dB 1.0E-06 1.0E-07
Digital video
N
o
d
e
A
m
p
T
a
p
S
e
t-to
p
Expected MER & BER results
Pre FEC
BER
Post FEC
BER
MER
H
e
a
d
e
n
d
T
a
p
Scientific notation
BER (bit error rate) measurements are
expressed in terms of errors divided by the
total number of un-errored bits transmitted or
received. Because the number of errors is very
small compared to the number of bits transmit-
ted, the measurement is typically expressed in
scientific notation. For example, one error out
of one million bits would be expressed as
1/1,000,000 or 1.0 E-6. Confusion often arises
when a second measurement is compared. Is
7.0 E-7 better or worse? 7.0 E-7 means seven
errors out of 10 million bits, which is actually a
little better than one in one million. The chart at
right may be helpful in interpreting scientific
notation.
One important note: Many instruments will
read 0 (zero) or 0.0E-0 when no errors have
been detected. E0 or E-0 is equal to 1, but the
leading 0 makes the measurement equal to 0.
1.00E+00 1/1 One
1.00E-01 1/10 One in Ten
1.00E-02 1/100 One in One Hundred
1.00E-03 1/1,000 One in One Thousand
1.00E-04 1/10,000 One in Ten Thousand
1.00E-05 1/100,000 One in One Hundred Thousand
1.00E-06 1/1,000,000 One in One Million
1.00E-07 1/10,000,000 One in Ten Million
1.00E-08 1/100,000,000 One in One Hundred Million
1.00E-09 1/1,000,000,000 One in One Billion
1.00E-10 1/10,000,000,000 One in Ten Billion
1.00E-11 1/100,000,000,000 One in One Hundred Billion
1.00E-12 1/1,000,000,000,000 One in One Trillion
0.00E-00 0 x 1 Zero (no errors)
SCIENTIFIC NOTATION
The publisher gratefully acknowledges
Trilithic Inc., Sunrise Telecom, Acterna and
others for contributing content to this chart.
The physical RF layer also contains important piece parts that need to be acounted for.
? ?
PCMM architecture
The PacketCable Multimedia (PCMM) architecture could soon play a big role with a range of IP-based applications,
including video telephony and video streaming. Taking a step beyond the primary line, voice-centric PacketCable 1.x
architecture and layering itself on the DOCSIS 1.1 and 2.0 platforms, PCMM injects quality of service (QoS) into IP-
based, latency-sensitive applications.
Application Manager (AM)
The AM resides in the Session Control Domain (SCD), a logical grouping of elements that offer applications and
content to service subscribers. The AM also coordinates subscriber initiated requests for application sessions with
access to the resources needed to meet those requests, and maintains application-level state. The AM may reside on
the MSOs network or it may reside outside this domain and interact with the MSO network via a particular trust
relationship that is typically defined by and enforced on the basis of a Service Level Agreement. The AM may be
controlled by the operator or a third party.
Record Keeping Server (RKS)
Similar to its role in PacketCable 1.x, the PCMM RKS receives event messages pertaining to policy decisions from
the Policy Server and event messages pertaining to QoS resource usage from the CMTS. In the PCMM architecture,
the RKS does not receive messages directly from the Application Manager. However, the AM can embed opaque data
in messages that it sends to the Policy Server, and this data can then be included in event messages that are
subsequently sent to the RKS.