This paper investigates the effects of group (or inter-destination) synchronization control over haptic media in a networked game where two players move objects competitively by manipulating haptic interface devices. The group synchronization control adjusts the output timing of haptic media among multiple players. By experiment, we demonstrate the effectiveness of the control. We also discuss the fairness between the two players quantitatively.

NAND-structured trench capacitor cell technologies for 256 Mb DRAM and beyond have been developed. The NAND-structured cell has four memory cells connected in series. The cell size can be reduced to 56% of the conventional cell. A substrate plate trench capacitor cell was adapted to this layout. The NAND-structured trench capacitor cell can achieve sufficient storage capacitance within the restricted capacitor area. A sufficient capacitance of 40 fF was achieved when the size and depth of trench were 0.5 µm and 5.0 µm, respectively. The most important point for realizing the NAND-structured trench capacitor cell is how to reduce the leakage current from the storage node. There are two main sources; one is the leakage current to the neighboring cells, the other is the leakage current to Pwell. These leakage currents have been investigated. An experimental 256 Mb DRAM with the NAND-structured cell was fabricated using the 0.4 µm design rule. The chip size is 464 mm2, which is 68% of a conventional DRAM of the same design rule. This is the result of the reduction of the memory cell area by the NAND-structured cell and the introduction of the open-bit-line arrangement.

This paper assesses the media synchronization quality of recovery control schemes from asynchrony, which are referred to as reactive control schemes here, in terms of objective and subjective measures. We deal with four reactive control techniques: skipping, discarding, shortening and extension of output duration, and virtual-time contraction and expansion. We have carried out subjective and objective assessment of the media synchronization quality of nine schemes which consist of combinations of the four techniques. The paper makes a comparison of media synchronization quality among the schemes. It also clarifies the relations between the two kinds of quality measures.

Multi-sensory communications with haptics attract a number of researchers in recent years. To provide services of the communications with high realistic sensations, the researchers focus on the quality of service (QoS) control, which keeps as high quality as possible, and the quality of experience (QoE) assessment, which is carried out to investigate the influence on user perception and to verify the effectiveness of QoS control. In this paper, we report the present status of studies on multi-sensory communications with haptics. Then, we divide applications of the communications into applications in virtual environments and those in real environments, and we mainly describe collaborative work and competitive work in each of the virtual and real environments. We also explain QoS control which is applied to the applications and QoE assessment carried out in them. Furthermore, we discuss the future directions of studies on multi-sensory communications.

This paper proposes a group synchronization mechanism which synchronizes slave destinations with the master destination for stored media in multicast communications. At the master and slave destinations, an intra-stream and an inter-stream synchronization mechanisms which were previously proposed by the authors are employed to output the master media stream and slave media streams synchronously. We achieve group synchronization by adjusting the output timing of the master media stream at each slave destination to that at the master destination. We also deal with control of joining an in-progress multicast group. The paper presents experimental results using an interconnected ATM-Ethernet LAN, which is a kind of heterogeneous network. In our experimental system, stored voice and video streams are multicast from a source to plural destinations distributed among distinct networks, and then they are synchronized and output. Furthermore, the paper demonstrates the effectiveness of the mechanism.

This paper reports experimental results of a media synchronization mechanism which was proposed by the authors, focusing on the graceful recovery scheme. The proposed method consists of intra-stream and inter-stream synchronization mechanisms. The inter-stream synchronization control is performed after the intra-stream synchronization control over each media unit (MU) such as a video frame. Then, whether the intra-stream synchronization is still maintained or not is checked. In the experimental system, video and voice stored in a source workstation are transferred to a destination workstation via an FDDI network, and then they are synchronized and outputted at the destination (i.e., lip-synch). At the transmission of each MU, we simulate network delay jitters by generating a pseudo-delay which is exponentially distributed. Using the system, we have confirmed the validity of the mechanism. We also clarify how to set the threshold and parameter values defined in the mechanism by evaluating mean square error and average MU rate or by subjective assessment. Furthermore, we demonstrate that the intra-stream synchronization control for each streams in addition to the inter-stream control is necessary for high quality synchronization.

This paper proposes a scheme for joint synchronization between stored media with interactive control and live media in multicast communications. We deal with visual search control, such as fast-forward and fast-reverse, as interactive control. The proposed scheme enables visual search by enhancing the virtual-time rendering (VTR) media synchronization algorithm, which the authors previously proposed, and adjusts the timing of changing the visual search mode among destinations by carrying out group synchronization control. We also demonstrate the effectiveness of the scheme by experiment.

This paper presents results of subjective assessment of the media synchronization quality in the virtual-time rendering (VTR) media synchronization algorithm. For the assessment, stored voice and video streams were transmitted as two separate transport streams from a source to a destination on various traffic conditions in an experimental system. At the destination, they were output after synchronization control. We subjectively assessed the quality of media synchronization in a systematic way. This paper examines the effects of the difference between methods of recovery from asynchrony on the media synchronization quality. The paper also clarifies the relationships between the subjective and objective performance measures. Furthermore, it examines the effect of the difference in scene between media streams and that of the modification of the target output time on the media synchronization quality.

This paper proposes a media synchronization scheme with causality control for distributed multimedia applications in which the temporal and causal relationships exist among media streams such as computer data, voice, and video. In the scheme, the Δ-causality control is performed for causality, and the Virtual-Time Rendering (VTR) algorithm, which the authors previously proposed, is used for media synchronization. The paper deals with a networked shooting game as an example of such applications and demonstrates the effectiveness of the scheme by experiment.

Various kinds of content replication strategies in pure P2P networks have recently been examined. However, such strategies have not been thoroughly considered in hybrid P2P networks. In a hybrid P2P network, the target content can easily be found because there is a server that controls each peer and its content. Therefore, it is important to decrease futile storage resource consumption, since the data search cost through the network is relatively small. This paper proposes an effective content replication strategy that takes into account storage capacity restrictions. In brief, this method restricts the number of contents replicas possessed by a peer using threshold-based control by relocating or deleting excess replicas. Furthermore, the effectiveness of the proposal is evaluated using computer simulations.

The H.264/AVC standard provides several new error-resilient features to enable the reliable transmission of compressed video signals over lossy packet networks. Flexible Macroblock Ordering (FMO) is one of the most interesting resilient features within the H.264/AVC standard. Unlike former standards, in which slices were constructed out of consecutive raster scan macroblocks, FMO suggests new slices composed of spatially distributed Macroblocks (MBs), and organized in a mixed-up fashion. H.264/AVC specifies seven types of FMO. The standard defines also an explicit FMO type (Type 6), which allows explicitly assignment of each MB within the frame to any available slice groups. Therefore new FMO types can be used and integrated into H264/AVC without violating the standard. In this paper we propose a new Explicit Chessboard-Wipe (ECW) Flexible Macroblocks Ordering (FMO) technique, which outperforms all other FMO types. The new ECW ordering results in effective error scattering which maximizes the number of correctly received macroblocks located around corrupted macroblocks, leading to better error concealment. Performance evaluations demonstrate that the proposed Explicit FMO approach outperforms all the FMO types. Both subjective and objective visual quality comparative study has been also carried out in order to validate the proposed approach.

This paper presents a performance comparison between the single-stream and the multi-stream approaches to lip synchronization of live media (voice and video). The former transmits a single transport stream of interleaved voice and video, while the latter treats the two media as separate transport streams. Each approach has an option not to exert the synchronization control at the destination, which leads to four basic schemes. On an interconnected ATM-wireless LAN, we implemented the four basic schemes with RTP/RTCP on top of UDP and two variants which exercise dynamic resolution control of JPEG video. Making the performance measurement of the six schemes, we compare them to identify and evaluate advantages and disadvantages of each approach. We then show that the performance difference between the two approaches is small and that the dynamic resolution control improves the synchronization quality.

This paper studies congestion control schemes for integrated variable bit-rate (VBR) video and data communications, where the quality of service (QOS) of each medium needs to be satisfied. In order to control congestion, we exert here either dynamic resolution control or QOS control. The dynamic resolution control scheme in this paper dynamically changes the temporal or spatial resolution of video according to the network loads. The QOS control scheme here assigns a constant capacity of buffer to each connection and determines the video resolution in order to guarantee the QOS of each medium at the connection establishment. The performance of these schemes is evaluated through simulation in terms of throughput, video frame delay probability distribution, and video frame loss rate. We also examine the effects of priority scheduling and packet discarding on the performance. Numerical results indicate that both dynamic resolution and QOS control attain low delay jitters as well as large video and data throughput. In particular, the QOS control is shown to be more suitable for integrated VBR video and data communications.

This paper studies a set of lip synchronization mechanisms for heterogeneous network environments. The set consists of four schemes, types 0 through 3, which are classified into the single-stream approach and the multi-stream approach. Types 0 and 1 belong to the single-stream approach, which interleaves voice and video to form a single transport stream for transmission. On the other hand, types 2 and 3, both of which are the multi-stream approach, set up separate transport streams for the individual media streams. Types 0 and 2 do not exert synchronization control at the destination, while types 1 and 3 do. We first discuss the features of each type in terms of networks intended for use, required synchronization quality of each medium, physical locations of media sources and implementation complexity. Then, a synchronization algorithm, which is referred to as the virtual-time rendering (VTR) algorithm, is specified for stored media; MPEG video and voice are considered in this paper. We implemented the four types on an ATM LAN and on an interconnected ATM-wireless LAN under the TCP protocol. The mean square error of synchronization, total pause time, throughput and total output time were measured in each of the two networks. We compare the measured performance among the four types to find out which one is the most suitable for a given condition of the underlying communication network and traffic.

This paper proposes a media synchronization mechanism for live media streams. The mechanism can also handle stored media streams by changing parameter values. The authors have implemented the mechanism on a lip-synch experimental system. Live video and voice streams input at a source workstation are transferred, and then they are synchronized and output at a destination workstation. This paper also evaluates the system performance such as mean square error of synchronization, average output rate, and average delay.

This letter analyzes the performance of a virtual-token passing scheme, fair BRAM, for local area networks. A Markovian model of the system is developed and analyzed by the equilibrium point analysis. The throughput and average message delay characteristics are shown.

This paper studies a congestion control scheme in integrated variable bit-rate video, audio and data (e. g. , image or text) communications, where each video stream is synchronized with the corresponding audio stream. When the audio and video streams are output, media synchronization control is performed. To avoid congestion, we employ a dynamic video resolution control scheme which dynamically changes the video encoding rate according to the network loads. By simulation, the paper evaluates the performance of the scheme in terms of throughput, loss rate, average delay, and mean square error of synchronization. Numerical results show the effectiveness of the scheme.

This paper studies effect of packet scheduling algorithms at routers on media synchronization quality in live audio and video transmission by experiment. In the experiment, we deal with four packet scheduling algorithms: First-In First-Out, Priority Queueing, Class-Based Queueing and Weighted Fair Queueing. We assess the synchronization quality of both intra-stream and inter-stream with and without media synchronization control. The paper clarifies the features of each algorithm from a media synchronization point of view. A comparison of the experimental results shows that Weighted Fair Queueing is the most efficient packet scheduling algorithm for continuous media among the four.