Online Video Streaming – Popular Way To Enjoy Movies

Streaming media is the most popular way of enjoying films because it transmits files from internet for immediate playback instead of downloading file for later playback. Internet television and radio broadcasts are enjoyed popularly through online video streaming and it is a favorite way to watch movies online.

How Is It Used?

For online video streaming, usually high bandwidth network connection is needed. Particular bandwidth requirement depends on the sort of content. E.g. for watching high resolution video needs much more bandwidth than that with low resolution.

To access media streams, you have to open audio/video players on your computer and start a connection to a server system. These media servers can be special-purpose devices or Web servers over the internet, set up particularly for high-performance streaming.

The bandwidth of a video stream is its bit rate. If this bit rate drops below the rate required to support instant playback, the result is dropped media frames and/or loss of sound. Streaming video systems usually use real-time data compression technology to reduce the amount of bandwidth utilized on each connection. Some video streaming systems can also be established to support Quality of Service (QoS) to help keep the required performance.

To Set Computer for Streaming Videos

Certain network protocols like Real Time Streaming Protocol (RTSP) have been particularly developed for streaming videos. HTTP can be used too if the content consists of files stored on any web server. Media player applications have support incorporated for the required protocols whereby users typically don’t have to change any settings on computer to get audio/video streams. Media player examples are:

• RealPlayer
• QuickTime
• Windows Media Player

Content suppliers wishing to deliver streams can establish a server environment in many different manners:

• To purchase a commercial software/hardware system for media streaming. These typically interface with television broadcast and also internet, and they even support higher performance streaming in several cases.
• To subscribe to one of the web servers providing online live streaming video like ustream or justin.tv
• To create a private internet media server through installation of specialized commercial software on a web server. Examples of such software are Adobe Flash Media and RealNetwork Helix Server.