disclosed is a system and method for transmitting a data packet from a source to a destination via a network path having a number of hops the sum of a playback delay associated with the data packet and the number of hops are stored in a header of the data packet the data packet is transmitted from the source to the destination via the network path application_number US 47419706 A description in accordance with an embodiment of the present invention fig4 shows a block diagram of communications sent from a sending node 404 to a receiving node 406 in one embodiment the sending node 404 and or the receiving node 406 are wireless telephones the sending node 404 transmits packets to a transmitting router 408 e g a base station router bsr the transmitting router 408 can set the tos or tc field of a packet to be diff serv compliant the transmitting router 408 then sets the ttl value to a predetermined maximum i e ttl max this predetermined maximum can be a parameter negotiated between the transmitting router 408 and a destination router 424 e g a bsr ttl neg e g in a session initiation protocol sip session description protocol sdp session.