When most people hear the word Apple, they immediately think of solutions that require adding Macintosh computers to their networks. With Apple's Darwin Streaming Server, this couldn't be further from the truth. Apple's streaming server is available for several operating systems as a precompiled binary or as source code. In our blind testing, our judges picked the images from our Darwin Streaming Server as either the best or the second best in our five bandwidth tests. And with the server software being given away, finding fault with it is hard.
We tested Darwin Streaming Server public beta 4 on an Intel-powered whitebox running FreeBSD, as well as a Macintosh G4 PowerMac running Apple's OS X. Since a FreeBSD version of the beta was not available, we downloaded the source code and gave it a quick compile.
Once the server was started, it was ready to go. A browser-based interface is available to create playlists (a group of movies to be shown in succession) as well as manage the server and set up downstream proxy servers. All we needed was the stats page, as everything else gets set up automatically. To play prerecorded video, copy the file to the server and place it in whichever directory you have specified to contain streamed files. The server has no problems delivering the same clip to several players at the same time or in staggered playback tests.
Apple's directions for streaming a live video source are very simple. When we first read the instructions, we thought something was missing. But, indeed, the process was quite basic. That said, this is the one area that could use a smidgen of improvement. RealNetworks' RealSystem iQ server is actually easier to use for this purpose.
We chose a Winnov Videum 1000 capture card ($249) to capture the live video on a Windows 2000 computer and Sorenson Media's Broadcaster ($249) compression software with Sorenson 3 Professional encoder ($499) to encode the video at the desired bandwidth and send it to the streaming server. Sorenson also has a version of the software for Macintosh OS-based systems. If your video source is a digital camera, the Macintosh solution is better, as a direct FireWire (IEEE 1394) connection can be made between the computer and camera. You won't need a video capture card, and your video will remain a true digital stream.
Broadcaster lets the user specify the bandwidth along with frame rate and size, but we created our own. Predefined choices are available, but they seem to favor the H.261 encoder (an older standard than MPEG) built into Broadcaster instead of the Sorenson 3. In our blind tests, the H.261 encoder had very low scores; our testers preferred the Sorenson 3 encoded video.
Once we configured Broadcaster, we encountered two minor problems. First, the streaming server must be told of the stream to be sent to it, via an SDP (Session Description Protocol) file that is created and sent to the server by FTP. Creating the file requires clicking on the "announce" button within Broadcaster and telling it where to save the file on the encoding computer, then copying the file to the streaming server. Performing multiple tests with different bandwidth and quality settings, as we did, becomes tedious.
Even more annoying, each SDP file had to be edited to delete a line that specified timing for the stream before the server would send the video to the players. Either Sorenson needs to delete this line from the SDP file or Apple needs to ignore it. This problem should be resolved by the time you read this, as Apple has introduced its own compression/broadcasting software that will work with its server directly.
With the SDP file copied to the streaming server, the players need only be told of the path and file name before the video begins. The Sorenson 3 compressor is a VBR (variable bit rate) codec, unlike RealNetworks' and Microsoft's solutions, and is therefore more bandwidth-efficient in transmission: Only the necessary data is transmitted. This is obvious when looking at network usage in "Apple Darwin Video Stream". The Apple player's buffering is the quickest of all three: just 10 to 12 seconds, compared with 15 to 20 seconds for RealNetworks' and Microsoft's players.
Darwin Streaming Server 4, free download available; QuickTime Streaming Server 4, free download available; QuickTime Player 5, free download available. Apple, (800) MY-APPLE, (408) 996-1010. www.apple.com
RealNetworks RealSystem iQ
Offering the most expensive of the solutions we tested, RealNetworks did provide us with the easiest-to-configure and -use servers. RealSystem iQ server might have edged out Apple's Darwin Server were it not for the price, which ratchets up with the more streams you need to serve. For large needs, this can quickly add up into the tens of thousands of dollars. Even a small enterprise of 500 users would pay $3,995 for the server software only; a 2,000-user company would wind up shelling out $5,995.
Tweaking the RealSystem server beyond the simple setup is also not for the faint of heart or the inexperienced. While RealNetworks provides reams of documentation on its Web site on how to twiddle every nut and bolt, what's missing is the simple, step-by-step "Here's how to get it working" stuff. We later found out we were making the process more difficult than it really was: For our purposes, the "as installed" version works just fine.
We encountered no problems while using the RealSystem iQ server, though we found it temperamental to install on our FreeBSD server. That install would coredump when the installer tried to start the server processes. When started manually, the server acted as if it were working, but we couldn't access it via the Web browser to configure and monitor it. Ditching the instructions, we were able to get everything started by using the default.cfg configuration file instead of the one created by the install and recommended by the directions, then starting the server manually.
We loaded RealSystem Producer Plus 8.5 on a Windows 2000 computer to perform our encoding. We also installed a ViewCast Corp. Osprey 500-DV Pro video capture card ($1,995) to pull in video. You don't need to spend nearly $2,000 for a video capture card, but RealNetworks and Microsoft recommended the card for our testing purposes. The ViewCast card has a built-in FireWire interface so we could easily bring the video and audio in through this connection. The hardest part of working with this card was getting it into the computer. With the BNC and other connectors hanging off the back, it's tough to angle the card into a PCI slot without needing to bend the back of the computer out of the way.
Producer is extremely easy to use. It recognized the ViewCast card automatically and walked us through setting up our encoding by selecting the type of audio and video to be generated. Producer will encode pre-existing or live video for playback by the server. Unlike the Sorenson Broadcaster, RealSystem Producer asks the IP address of the RealSystem iQ Server and sets up the connection and files without user intervention. No need to edit and copy any files to the server -- what a relief.
Our judges deemed Producer's low-bit-rate video the best. This shows RealNetworks' strength of creating and streaming video for the Internet to 56-Kbps modem users. RealNetworks came in second, behind Apple-Sorenson, for the midrange bit rates and third at our highest test bit rate.
We had problems with banding -- solid colors appearing where color gradation is supposed to be -- in our screen captures when we viewed them using the RealOne Player. Although we tried several times to eliminate it, we were unsuccessful and instead told our judges to ignore it. The video stream is also at a fairly constant bit rate (see "RealNetworks RealServer iQ Video Stream," below). This makes it easier for enterprises transmitting over bandwidth-restricted networks but may not offer the efficiency of a VBR encoder like Sorenson.
For the enterprise customer with a heterogeneous network, RealNetworks has a version of its RealOne Player for just about every Windows and Unix platform, though there's still no support for Macintosh OS X. RealNetworks is working on a version for the new Apple operating system but won't have it ready until later this year. The downside to the RealNetworks players is the time needed to buffer data before playing begins. RealOne Player takes between 15 and 20 seconds to buffer and begin playing.
RealNetworks is also the only player that has scrolling ad space for channels to news and other entertainment organizations. We could minimize the window to get rid of this, but then we couldn't get to the volume and window-size controls. We also found it annoying that immediately after downloading the player from RealNetworks' Web site, we were notified that the player was out of date.
RealSystem iQ: RealSystem Server Basic, free for 25 concurrent viewers; RealSystem Server Plus, $1,995 for 60 concurrent viewers; RealSystem Server Intranet, starting at $3,995 for 200 to 500 concurrent viewers; RealSystem Server Professional, starts at $5,995 for 100 to 2,000 concurrent viewers; RealSystem Producer Plus 8.5, $199.95; RealOne Player, free. RealNetworks, (800) 444-8011, (206) 674-2700. www.realnetworks.com
Microsoft Windows Media Services
Microsoft Media Services' images scored dead last in four of our five quality tests. Unless you're an all-Microsoft shop, you can do better. Then again, it is free if you're already using Windows 2000 Server. And if you're using anything else, you can't have it anyway, since Windows Media Services isn't available as a standalone product.
For streaming a live video source, Media Services is the most difficult to configure, even though Microsoft provides step-by-step instructions for setting up such a stream. Live sources require users to create either a unicast (one sender, one receiver) or a multicast (one sender, many simultaneous receivers) station. A setup wizard is available to step you through the process, which creates the connection between the server and the encoder. While an experienced person could whip through this easily, we wish we could do it from one place instead of having to set up the encoder and server separately.
Windows Media Encoder provides another setup wizard to configure the encoding. We used the same ViewCast video capture card as for the tests with RealNetworks' solution. Media Encoder allows simple setup of the compression for the audio and video. Preconfigured settings are available for those that want a quick process to stream video. By comparison, streaming a pre-existing video clip is no problem; just copy the clip to the server, and it's ready to be played.
While the Windows Media stream has a constant bit rate for the most part, we found that occasionally the data stream undulated at lower bit rates. The data rate would start out with slight shifts that would build on themselves until no packets got out in one second and had to be combined with the next second's packets. The rate would then slowly begin settling back out but would begin again a few minutes later. We tried several times to replicate this to see if it was in some way tied to the video source, but we found no correlation. While this didn't affect the video quality in our tests, it could be disastrous on networks that employ traffic shaping or other QoS (Quality of Service) measures.
We also had a problem of "jail bars" appearing from time to time at some of the bandwidths we tested. These are black and white vertical bars about 5 pixels in width that appeared over the upper half of the video for just one or two frames, then vanished. The jail bars occurred at random times. We could neither reproduce them at will nor could we explain why they occurred. Microsoft never returned a call when we sought an explanation.
On the player side, Microsoft supports all its own OSes as well as those from Apple. Support of Unix players is nonexistent except for an older version for Sun Microsystems Solaris.
Buffering time in Windows Media Player is about the same as that in RealSystem iQ: 15 to 20 seconds. Microsoft aims to drastically reduce buffering times in its next release, code-named Corona. Instead of transmitting at normal rates during the buffer process, the server will instead burst the information to the client initially. This won't work if there isn't enough unused bandwidth to burst the buffer.
Windows Media Services, included with the Windows 2000 Server; Windows 2000 Server, $1,199 with 10 client access licenses; Windows Media Player, free. Microsoft Corp., (800) 426-9400, (425) 882-8080; fax (425) 936-7329. microsoft.com/windowsmedia/
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