An Adaptive Buffering Method for Practical HTTP Live Streaming on Smart OTT STBs

In this paper, we address the channel zapping time problem of video streaming services based on HTTP Live Streaming (HLS) on smart Over-The-Top Set-Top Boxes (OTT STBs). Experimental analysis of the channel zapping time, show that smart OTT STBs inevitably suffer from the accumulated zapping time through channel change request, Internet Group Management Protocol (IGMP) leave/join, synchronization delay, video buffer delay, and STB processing delay when providing HLS services. As a practical solution for the zapping time reduction, an adaptive buffering method is proposed. The proposed method exploits two adaptive buffers added to the basic HLS player. These two adaptive buffers are responsible for constantly buffering previous and next channels relative to the current channel. Implementation and test results show that a stable zapping time less than one second can be achieved even under diverse video bitrate changes and varying network conditions by the proposed adaptive buffering method.