Equations

Impacts of delay on TCP throughput

The throughput of a single TCP session is not only constrained by the available bandwidth, but also by delay and packet loss rate. Any layer 2 error correction method needs to find the right balance between adding delay and accepting packet loss.

The Mathis formula gives an upper bound:

Max DATA throughput rate < (MSS/RTT)*(1 / sqrt(p))

• MSS: maximum segment size
• RTT: round trip time
• p: packet loss rate

RfC 3819, Section 8.5 gives a more accurate estimate:

                                         MSS
           BW = --------------------------------------------------------
                RTT*sqrt(1.33*p) + RTO*p*[1+32*p^2]*min[1,3*sqrt(.75*p)]

   where

           BW   is the maximum TCP throughout achievable by an
                individual TCP flow
           MSS  is the TCP segment size being used by the connection
           RTT  is the end-to-end round trip time of the TCP connection
           RTO  is the packet timeout (based on RTT)
           p    is the packet loss rate for the path
                (i.e., .01 if there is 1% packet loss)