E-model MOS estimate precision improvement and modelling of jitter effects

Abstract

This paper deals with the ITU-T E-model, which is used for non-intrusive MOS VoIP call quality estimation on IP networks. The pros of E-model are computational simplicity and usability on real-time traffic. The cons, as shown in our previous work, are the inability of E-model to reflect effects of network jitter present on real traffic flows and jitter-buffer behavior on end user devices. These effects are visible mostly on traffic over WAN, internet and radio networks and cause the E-model MOS call quality estimate to be noticeably too optimistic. In this paper, we propose a modification to E-model using previously proposed Pplef (effective packet loss) using jitter and jitter-buffer model based on Pareto/D/1/K system. We subsequently perform optimization of newly added parameters reflecting jitter effects into E-model by using PESQ intrusive measurement method as a reference for selected audio codecs. Function fitting and parameter optimization is performed under varying delay, packet loss, jitter and different jitter-buffer sizes for both, correlated and uncorrelated long-tailed network traffic.