Many LECs, and other network operators, are deploying IP-based Television services (IPTV) to complete the "triple play" delivery of voice, video and data services to their residential subscribers. In addition to providing an important new source of revenues, IPTV enables established telephone companies to compete more effectively with cable MSOs.

While nearly all of the focus on deploying IPTV revolves around the access infrastructure and the head-end, this transition is also having a significant impact on the critical technologies and systems positioned between these two segments of the network. For one, new IP-based head-end and access network equipment utilizes gigabit Ethernet for network connectivity. At the same time, Video on Demand (VoD) and HDTV can easily overwhelm existing network capacity.

Lastly, packet loss can result in poor video quality such as tiling and frame freezing, while packet delay can result in slow channel change times – both of which ultimately cause customer dissatisfaction.

Optimizing the Transport Network for IPTV

Turin Networks addresses these challenges with a range of products that unify layer 2 Ethernet switching and optical transport capabilities. Optimized for deployments in the head-end, central offices and outside plant (OSP) environments, Turin’s highly-scalable Traverse® and TraverseEdge™ platforms enable the migration to a high-capacity optical transport infrastructure that efficiently and reliably distributes GigE-based IPTV traffic without the need to build a new network infrastructure. Leveraging the advantages of next generation SONET/SDH with carrier Ethernet, Turin’s products ensure guaranteed bandwidth with ultra-low latency and jitter – an essential requirement for video transport – as well as carrier-grade network reliability and availability. This architecture also makes certain that broadcast video, which is the most prevalent IPTV service today, can be transported with maximum efficiency using a drop and continue topology.

Turin products packet-optimize the transport infrastructure by integrating carrier Ethernet switching from 1Mbps to 10Gbps. By supporting a variety of service delivery options such as VLAN switching and advanced traffic management features, Turin products support the various video distribution architectures such as multicast IPTV and unicast VoD services.