We have tested Multi bit-rate “Adaptive Streaming,” but can’t decide if we should use this or take a Youtube “Progressive Download” approach for our VOD website. Can you guys give us some opinions to help us make our decision?
Thanks!
There are lot of things involve in making decision between them.
Do you need security? To which players or devices you are going to deliver streams? How many users will play concurrently? What locations do you plan to deliver? How frequent you will be updating VoD files?
Also, take a look at this guide for encoding vod files:
https://www.wowza.com/docs/how-to-encode-video-on-demand-content
Richard
Triple,
I think 3500kbps is way too much for most devices. A typical max bitrate I see for commercial websites is about 1500kbps. Additionally, the main benefit of multi-bitrate is the ability to drop the stream way down so slow devices/connections do not experience an interruption of service. Therefore, I suggest adding 350kbps and 150kbps encodes to your multi-bitrate groups.
Like Jason said, it’s totally up to you. You’ll have to test and decide on the quality you want for the devices you want to serve.
I think I remember the daily show maxing out at 1500kbps. Youtube does 3-4k for 1080p. You can see their bitrates here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/YouTube#Quality_and_codecs
There are lot of things involve in making decision between them.
Do you need security? To which players or devices you are going to deliver streams? How many users will play concurrently? What locations do you plan to deliver? How frequent you will be updating VoD files?
Good questions. Answers…
Security yes. Streaming to Flash, Html 5, and Apple devices. Number of users may vary from dozens to hundreds concurrently. Audience is English based… server in the US where we will have most of our customers. VoD files update: 5 per week. 7 per week max.
Thanks for the replies everyone. I like the idea of adaptive streaming over progressive download. Does this look like a good spread for our multi-bitrate files? Does Wowza have a recommendation?
900, 1200, 1800, 2400, 3500 (in kbps)
1200(kbps) is in my opinion not needed because you have covered all the bases at this point.
900(kbps) is a little high for a phone unless its using WiFi which may not be accessible to everyone watching your stream
If you wanted this many streams i would replace 1200kbps with a 600kbps stream for phones on wireless networks etc.
Jason
Jason,
Thank you for the reply. Valuable information in your post. I don’t think our server is doing transcoding. We are uploading all of these VOD file types to the server and using the multi-bitrate adaptive streaming technique with a playlist file and JWPlayer.
In your scenario, if we replaced the 1200 stream with a 600 version, do you think 900 is still needed or not? Are you proposing two mobile versions?
Thank you kindly 
Triple,
I think 3500kbps is way too much for most devices. A typical max bitrate I see for commercial websites is about 1500kbps. Additionally, the main benefit of multi-bitrate is the ability to drop the stream way down so slow devices/connections do not experience an interruption of service. Therefore, I suggest adding 350kbps and 150kbps encodes to your multi-bitrate groups.
randall,
Thanks for the feedback. I’m doing VOD streaming as indicated above and was focusing on desktop users. You think over 1500kbps is too high for this scenario? I would love additional info.
Jason has indicated: 600, 1800, 2400, 3500.
randall has indicated: 150, 350, 600, 900, 1200, 1500
What do we do gang?
triple
Thanks everyone. To follow up, this is what we’ve decided for our VOD library:
Originally for desktop we had: 900, 1200, 1800, 2400, 3500 (a total of 9800kbps)
We wanted to add mobile.
We were processing videos from original source material. Even so, the difference in quality between 2400 and 3500 was negligible. We decided to axe 3500 and also 900 after Wowza community feedback.
Using a mix of our own research settings and Apples tech note recommendations for streaming, we now have video that will play on the desktop and many mobile devices. On the negative side, processing time has increased by about 30%. On the plus side, we’re saving a lot of space on our hard drive…not that it matters so much since space gets less expensive every day.
Here is our end result: 100, 200, 400, 600, 1200, 1800, 2400, 3500 (a total of 6700kbps)
Although everyone’s situation is unique, maybe this can help!
Best luck!
triple 
Hi
This is a decision that can only be made by you but in my opinion streaming has been the best solution.
progressive download involves more files based on connection type and etc where as streaming only requires a link to the content for each device.
Example for streaming links :
[Content name]_Flash
[Content name]_iOS
[Content name]_BB/Android
For progressive download you may need a app for each type of device.
Jason
Hi
As long as your server can handle the transcoding this is fine, is the source stream 3500(kbps)?
Because you cant transcode upwards in bitrate (you can but its not recommended because quality stays at the source stream level)
3500(kbps) is at a HD level which is acceptable if that’s what you want.
2400(kbps) is at a SD level and could be accessed from the iPad with good connectivity
1800(kbps) is at low level SD and is probably the iPad choice if connectivity isn’t great
1200(kbps) is in my opinion not needed because you have covered all the bases at this point.
900(kbps) is a little high for a phone unless its using WiFi which may not be accessible to everyone watching your stream
If you wanted this many streams i would replace 1200kbps with a 600kbps stream for phones on wireless networks etc.
Jason
Hi
Yes you’re correct, sorry I should have looked back at the original post before posting about the transcoder.
Its completely up to you but I did think that 900kbps is a little high for a phone but if the quality is not good enough at 600kbps then naturally you would just have the 900kbps stream.
If you don’t have a WiFi connection then you would struggle to watch but that’s life.
Jason
Hi
Just to correct you the steams you listed and the total bandwidth don’t match,
result: 100, 200, 400, 600, 1200, 1800, 2400, 3500 (a total of 10200kbps)
I’m sure the extra bandwidth won’t make much difference but I though i’d let you know.
Jason
Hi
Currently you’ll need to have the same file multiple times (1 for each bitrate you want) in the /content directory.
You can’t achieve on demand transcoding in the way you’ve described as currently the file (at specified bitrate) has to exist in order to play it.
Jason
We usually use apache server (progressive download) for VoD content but looking at your requirement, I would suggest to go with Wowza, it is really difficult to port HLS support over apache server to serve streams on idevices.
Hi,
I’m trying to create a Video content server for a client. As per client’s requirement, ABR is best suitable option in my view. As per my understanding, for ABR streaming of a video, it has to be encoded in various bit rate. This will result in more space utilization. Is there any way so that only single video is uploaded and trans-coding is performed dynamically? Please help me in closing client requirement.
Thanks in advance.
Regards,
Shashi Ranjan