All About Video and Voice Tests
Article ID: 244793
Updated On:
Products
Issue/Introduction
Voice and Video Tests
What are they?
Voice and Video Tests and assessments are used to test a network specifically for voice and video traffic which use different protocols than data traffic. Voice assessments use diagnostic techniques to test for a networks readiness for VoIP where and Voice and Video Tests simulate actual traffic to see how the network handles these packets
What is a codec?
A codec converts sounds from analogue signals to digital signals by sampling the sound a few thousand times every second and compresses them into IP packets.
What metrics do we care about for voice and video traffic?
Bandwidth utilisation, packet loss, latency and jitter. Voice and video use UDP to transport packets so there is no retransmission of lost packets so a high level of loss is easily noticed in end quality. High levels of latency can result in a ‘lag’ in connection.
Voice Assessments
What is it?
- A tool for assessing a network suitability for handling voice traffic.
- They do not require a monitoring point as a target.
- Use ICMP and diagnostics
- Basic voice assessments occur at a single point in time and use diagnostic techniques to infer voice quality.
- Advanced voice assessments occur over a longer time period and use both diagnostic and continuous monitoring to infer voice quality
- Requires additional voice license
Resolution
Configuration
https://techdocs.broadcom.com/us/en/ca-enterprise-software/it-operations-management/appneta/GA/analyze-results/network-performance-monitoring-delivery/delivery-testing/delivery-voice.html#title-voice-delivery_basic-voice-assessments
- Discover Targets allows you to search local subnets (or discovery range if configured) for possible targets
- Types of targets are: monitoring points, voice and video handsets, voice servers…
- Basic voice assessments support upto 250 concurrent calls but anything over 25 can cause noticeable network traffic
- Advanced voice assessments support upto 25 concurrent calls
- Advanced voice assessments must run for between 1hr and 14 days
- Call load ramp up allows for calls to gradually started- minimum ramp up duration is 30 minutes
Voice Tests
What is it?
- A simulation of actual voice calls to measure how your network handles actual voice traffic
- Assesses how network handles calls to multiple target MPs
- Source MPs require a voice license but target MPs do not require voice license
- Uses actual voice protocols (UDP-SIP/RTP/RTCP)
- Affects network performance so start with care
Configuration
https://techdocs.broadcom.com/us/en/ca-enterprise-software/it-operations-management/appneta/GA/analyze-results/network-performance-monitoring-delivery/delivery-testing/delivery-voice.html#title-voice-delivery_voice-tests
- Maximum number of calls or sessions is dependent on source and target MP load and codec selected. See here for MPs, legacy MPs & software MPs
- Tests can run from 1 minute to 7 days
- QoS settings & codec should be configures the same as network
Comparison of Voice Assessments and Tests
Video Tests
What are they?
- A simulation of actual video calls to measure how your network handles actual voice traffic
- Assesses how network handles calls to multiple target MPs
- Source MPs require a video license but target MPs do not require video license
- Uses actual voice protocols (UDP-SIP/RTP/RTCP)
- Affects network performance so start with care
Configuration:
- Monitoring point load capabilities is dependent on MP, codec and if bi directional. Limits may be found here
- Tests can run from 1 minute to 7 days
- QoS settings & codec should be configures the same as network
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