Requirements for IPTV Service

Network RequirementsA high speed connection to the Government Network is required. Each channel consumes around 1.2Mb of bandwidth per channel (video & audio) and there are current 6 channels available with a seventh due to come on stream shortly. Since multicast broadcasting is being used there should only ever be one stream requested from each connected site and multiple users at a site will not increase the bandwidth requirements. The GN connection must be capable of delivering multicast traffic, please note that Eircom’s BIP service does not currently support this but a workaround is being developed.

The multimedia VPN must be presented on a port on the GN switch or from the firewall the GN connection is made available on from, the VPN will then be connected to the router listed in the hardware requirements below for distribution on the LAN.

The LAN that the client machine/set top box (STB) will be connected to must support multicast traffic from the multimedia router to the client.

HardwareIn order to ensure security it is required that a router be installed to manage traffic coming from the multimedia VPN. Not only will this restrict traffic but it will also ensure that the multicast traffic is translated from the VPN onto the network. A Cisco 2600 or 3600 router would fulfil this requirement.

Network Access RequirementsThe source ip address for the multicast is 169.254.174.74, this is an address within the multimedia VPN range. The multicast addresses and ports are listed in the table below. This is the range that will be allowed through the router mentioned in the hardware section above.

Address UDP Port Channel225.1.1.1 2001 Dail225.1.1.2 2002 Seanad225.1.1.3 2003 CR1225.1.1.4 2004 CR2225.1.1.5 2005 CR3225.1.1.6 2006 CR4

There is also a redundant source ip address of 169.254.174.73 with an address range of :

Address UDP Port Channel225.1.1.7 2007 TBC225.1.1.8 2008 TBC225.1.1.9 2009 TBC225.1.1.10 2010 TBC225.1.1.11 2011 TBC225.1.1.12 2012 TBC

It should be noted that the redundant box is not currently broadcasting any Oireachtas feeds and is only being used for debugging purposes. However, the router should be set up to allow this traffic since, in the event of a failure in the primary box, traffic could originate from it.

The following section is an annotated listing from a router currently managing multicast traffic within the Department of Finance.

ip cef Enable Cisco Express Forwardingip multicast-routing Enable IP multicast routing on the routerinterface FastEthernet0/0 Interface connected to the internal networkdescription Connection to internal networkip address x.x.x.x m.m.m.m Set the internal IP address of the routerip pim sparse-dense-mode Enable IP multicast routing on this interface!interface FastEthernet0/1 Interface connected to the Campus LAN on the Multimedia VPNdescription Connection to DailTV VLAN on campusip address 169.254.x.x 255.255.254.0 An address from the customer's assigned address range in the Multimedia VPNip access-group FromDailTV in Only Dáil TV multicast traffic allowed inip access-group DenyEverything out Nothing at all allowed out (traffic originating from the router - such as PIM routing traffic - is exempt

from this ACL)

ip pim sparse-dense-mode Enable IP multicast routing on this interface!router eigrp 1redistribute connectedpassive-interface FastEthernet0/1network x.x.x.x distribute-list DenyEverything in FastEthernet0/1

ip access-list standard DenyEverythingdeny anyip access-list extended FromDailTV This ACL contains one entry matching each of the available multicast streamspermit udp host 169.254.174.74 host 225.1.1.1 eq 2001 Dailpermit udp host 169.254.174.74 host 225.1.1.2 eq 2002 Seanadpermit udp host 169.254.174.74 host 225.1.1.3 eq 2003 Committee Room 1permit udp host 169.254.174.74 host 225.1.1.4 eq 2004 Committee Room 2permit udp host 169.254.174.74 host 225.1.1.5 eq 2005 Committee Room 3permit udp host 169.254.174.74 host 225.1.1.6 eq 2006 Committee Room 4permit udp host 169.254.174.73 host 225.1.1.7 eq 2007 Dail (Backup)permit udp host 169.254.174.73 host 225.1.1.8 eq 2008 Seanad (Backup)permit udp host 169.254.174.73 host 225.1.1.9 eq 2009 Committee Room 1 (Backup)permit udp host 169.254.174.73 host 225.1.1.10 eq 2010 Committee Room 2 (Backup)permit udp host 169.254.174.73 host 225.1.1.11 eq 2011 Committee Room 3 (Backup)permit udp host 169.254.174.73 host 225.1.1.12 eq 2012 Committee Room 4 (Backup)

This section is for illustration only and will vary from one customer to another. This is the internal routing protocol on the internal LAN. The objective is to advertise 169.254.174.0/255.255.254.0 (the Campus LAN address of the Multimedia VPN) into your internal routing protocol. This is necessary to allow the multicast routes (which use the unicast routing table to determine the route back toward the source) to work. The same result to be achieved in several other ways.

Client RequirementsThere are two methods of viewing the IPTV channels at present. From a suitably equipped PC or via a set top box attached to a standard television.

PC BasedThe client software required is made up of two components. The Elecard MPEG Player (currently version 4.5 and costing US$20) and the Elecard AVC PlugIn for MPEG Player (currently version 2.0 and costing US$30). This software is available from http://www.elecard.com Listed below are the minimum system requirements as well as the recommended system requirements. Due to the high level of processing required for multicast video streaming the recommended specifications will significantly improve the end user experience:

Minimum RecommendedHardwarePentium III, Celeron, AMD, etc Pentium III/IV, AMD 2800+128 MB RAM 512 MB RAMAny VGA Card Direct X Compliant15 MB Hard disk space 15 MB Hard disk spaceSoftwareWindows 98/Me/2000/XP Windows 2000/XP

STB BasedUsing an Amino A124 Set Top Box the multicast channels can be viewed from a television equipped with a SCART socket. The 6 channels are then presented as channels 1 – 6 on the set top box. The STB requires a standard power socket and an Ethernet connection on the LAN. The STB can use both static and DHCP configured ip addresses.