Adaptation logic for varying a bitrate...

A streaming media playback device is provided for playing multimedia presentations with segments encoding video data at different quality levels for adaptive streaming through a network from a server, for example based on MPEG DASH. The streaming media playback device selects segments at a given quality level from those available at the server based on an adaptive bitrate setting and an oscillation measure. The adaptive bitrate setting is selected based on network bandwidth conditions. The oscillation measure provides an indication of how often the device switches between segments of different quality levels. The next segment is selected based on the adaptive bitrate setting unless the oscillation measure exceeds a threshold.