Patent ID: 7864798

Claim:
An apparatus for supporting voice over Internet protocol (VoIP) services over a wireless communication network, the apparatus comprising: a VoIP codec for encoding transmit data and decoding receive data, wherein bits sensitive to errors and bits not sensitive to errors are identified among the encoded transmit data for separate error protection; a controller configured to: specify a coding rate of the VoIP codec; and send a codec mode request to adjust the coding rate; an IP layer for generating a transmit VoIP packet by attaching an IP header to the encoded transmit data and processing a receive VoIP packet; a radio link control (RLC) layer for in-sequence delivery of the transmit VoIP packet and the receive VoIP packet; a medium access control (MAC) layer for transferring the transmit VoIP packet and the receive VoIP packet between communication peers; and a physical layer for transmitting the transmit VoIP packet and receiving the receive VoIP packet via a wireless channel, wherein one of the RLC layer or the MAC layer divides the transmit VoIP packet into a plurality of fragments whereby the sensitive bits and the non-sensitive bits are separately processed for error protection and the number of fragments including the sensitive bits is as small as possible.