COMMUNICATIONS USING ADAPTIVE MULTI-RATE CODECS

摘要

A communications network (10) includes a data network (24) that is coupled to a wireless access network (19) and other devices. The wireless access network (19) enables access by mobile stations (16, 17) of the data network (24). Each mobile station (16, 17), and optionally, one or more of other devices coupled to the data network (24), contains an adaptive multi-rate codec (coder/decoder) that can be set to operate at a plurality of rates. Based on the selected one of the plurality of rates, the mobile station (16 or 17) or other device sets a quality-of-service (QoS) indicator value in a packet carrying data, such as real-time data, over the wireless access network (19) and/or data network (24). By varying QoS requirements using the QoS indicator value for different codec rates, bandwidth requirements are varied so that more efficient usage of the data network is provided.