Collision-detection based rate-adaptation for video multicasting over IEEE 802.11 wireless networks

Wireless video multicasting/broadcasting is an efficient method for simultaneous transmission of data to a group of users. But the multicasting rates are fixed in current IEEE 802.11 PHYs standard. In this paper, we propose a novel collision-detection based rate-adaptation scheme (CDRA), which fully exploits the potential of rate adaptation capability of wireless physical layer, to improve service qualities of video multicasting. The received signal strength indication (RSSI) and packet error ratio (PER) are comprehensively used to detect collision. The PER-guided rate adjustment algorithm is performed when no collision happens. Otherwise the collision-avoid mechanism works. By detecting the collision, our scheme could adaptively select the maximum data rates for video multicasting. We construct a practical multicasting test-bed in IEEE 802.11b network and carry out extensive experiments. The results show that CDRA achieves throughput gain up to 166% and PSNR gain to 139% compared with existing methods.