Cross-layer assisted reliability design for wireless multimedia broadcast

In this paper, different error protection strategies in different protocol layers are discussed, in order to reliably broadcast multimedia data within existing wireless networks. In particular, we investigate the performance of additional forward error correction (FEC) in the physical layer, the radio link control (RLC) layer, and the RTP layer for multimedia broadcast and multicast services over GERAN systems. Advantages and drawbacks when applying error correction in different layers are shown. We introduce a simple receiver modification, referred to as permeable-layer receiver (PLR), which exploits traditionally useless information at the receiver, while the transmitter is kept unchanged. Significant performance gains are reported. Finally, the application to H.264/AVC based wireless video broadcast is discussed and the performance of different system designs for video transmission is shown.