what is pocket loss?

[Mike]

Is anybody kind enough to explain what is packet loss?

[adam]

Packet loss is one of the problems that affect some applications like VoIP, streaming videos, online gaming or other applications that run in real-time. What happens is the sender transmits the data packets which fail to reach the other end resulting in poor performance of VoIP or such applications.

Packet loss can occur due to poor signals or congested network or due to a specific router or hardware. Packet loss is usually followed by the receiver asking the sender to resend the data as he did not receive the data packet. One of the issues related to packet loss if it is caused by factors or network is that the missed packets might cause a kind of jitter with more or less all applications that use the network.

[Nick]

Packet loss defintiely leads to poor performance, sometimes much more annoying. It is because the protocols like TCP recover and retransmit the lost packets which eventually makes the thoroughput of the transmission degrade.

If there are more people hooked to internet, the router cannot help shaking out some data packets. Unless, packet loss becomes a vexing problem, you need not worry about it

[smith]

Your OS keeps a record of how many data packets(segments) are sent and how many are retransmitted thanks to the TCP protocols which recover and resend the lost data packets.

All you need to do is to type in the following command in the command window:
C:\>netstat -s -p tcp

If the retransmitted segments is juse one or two percent of total segments sent, you better do not meddle with anything as this packet loss is quite acceptable.

[Mike]

I understand packet loss is one of reasons why voice quality gets affected sometimes during my VoIP calls.

It is also clear to me that the sources of this error are many. How to find out exactly what causes packet loss? Is there any way I can find out why all this happens?

[smith]

If you find the voice quality fluctuating or irregular, in other words, if there are more jitters, it is the congestion in the network that causes the packet loss. The routers may deliberately discard a few data packets.

Sometimes, you will not feel jitters but packet losses happening at a significant rate. In that case, the damaged/corrupted data packets could cause potential packet loss. What usually happens is a faulty Ethernet cable induces FCS errors which lead to corruption of data packets. So, you should measure the packet losses from ethernet switches or routers and should take effective steps to rectify this problem.

Packet loss can occur due to hardware or incorrect configuration of devices like Ethernet interface. You should make sure that Ethernet interfaces in the both the ends are set to full duplex otherwise it will lead to duplex mismatch.

If your internet speed is low or you get poor signals, you should seek the help of your ISP.