By Robert F. Cruickshank III, Daniel J. Rice, Stargus, Inc.
This technical paper examines how analyzing customer bandwidth consumption and optimizing MSO RF network capacity can provide detailed insight and actionable information to increase the yield (i.e. utilized traffic carrying capacity) and profitability of DOCSIS™ networks.
This paper begins with a discussion of current bandwidth measurement approaches and their challenges. An alternative is then discussed and results are presented—from a software-based approach that uses the deployed cable modems and CMTSs as network 'sensors' to collect and analyze the upstream and downstream usage (and many other variables) on a per-subscriber level in hourly increments. This information is critical for enabling cable operators to assess the impact of Peer-to-Peer (P2P) and other applications and overall network performance for Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP).
This paper then provides a detailed overview of the process for optimizing DOCSIS networks to improve network capacity, performance, availability, and reliability by recommending and setting the appropriate configuration parameters for each CMTS RF Interface. Given the dynamic nature of HFC networks, deployment experience demonstrates that a single channel width, modulation and error correction configuration (i.e. a single modulation profile) is not effective for all RF interfaces. Field results show that network optimization has at least a doubling effect on the capacity and performance of DOCSIS networks.