Live Streaming Buffering Time

Wowza Streaming Engine
1

Hi,

I was trying to use the LiveStreaming application to stream a video via RTMP. But I realize that it takes the player quite a while to buffer before playing it. Is there a way to reduce this buffer time/size in the Wowza settings?

Thank you so much.

2

It will usually take a few seconds. To reduce the buffer time, you can reduce your bitrate, or increase your bandwidth. How long is it taking?

3

Take a look at this guide:

https://www.wowza.com/docs/how-to-set-up-low-latency-applications-in-wowza-streaming-engine-for-rtmp-streaming

Richard

4

It is normal. For h.264 video, Flash player needs about 60 frames before it starts playing, so if your video is 30 fps that is 2 second start time (plus server and network factors). You can set netstream buffer to 0 to get around this, but this can have bad side affects.

Richard

5

It’s not terribly abnormal

Richard

6

Thanks so much for your reply! It usually takes 3-4 seconds. Is it too much?

Other than changing the video, is there anything on the Wowza side I can do?

7

Hi richard.

Thanks for sharing this link. After following it, it still takes 2-3 seconds to load the stream. Is it normal?

Thanks again!

Take a look at this guide:

Low latency RTMP streaming with Wowza Streaming Engine

Richard

8

It is normal. For h.264 video, Flash player needs about 60 frames before it starts playing, so if your video is 30 fps that is 2 second start time (plus server and network factors). You can set netstream buffer to 0 to get around this, but this can have bad side affects.

Richard

Thanks again for your reply.

Should have provided more details… my stream was just a normal flv video, with mpeg encoding. Is it still normal then?