Abstract: A delay fluctuation absorbing method in which, at a cell receiver side, a fluctuation absorbing base time is calculated based on a decoding time of a heading cell among received cells, decoding time of cells stayed in a receive cell buffer for a predetermined monitoring time after receiving the heading cell is detected based on the number of such stayed cells, the fluctuation absorbing base time is corrected based on the decoding time of the stayed cells to determine a final fluctuation absorbing time.

Abstract: A cell transfer apparatus and method using a variable rate codec wherein a sequence number of each cell is determined by adding a weight corresponding to an encoding time of information. In a transmitting side, each of encoded pieces of information is cellulated to a predetermined length cell for each information having a length of integer times a predetermined unit length of information. A sequence number of a next cell is determined by adding as a weight the number of pieces of information having a unit length included in the last cell to a sequence number of a last cell, and is sent as being added to each cell. In a receiving side, reproduction timing numbers comprising serial numbers are sequentially generated at timings synchronous with the unit length of the pieces of information and compared with the sequence number added to each cell. When the both coincide, the information of that cell is decoded.