Wowza 4.0.3 and Akamai Push

Wowza Streaming Engine
1

Hi,

I have a setup we have a RTSP stream being pushed to Wowza, being transcoded in multiple bitrates and than being pushed to Akamai, When I try to play the stream from Wowza, either using RTMP or HDS the stream plays just fine. But when I try to play stream from Akamai HDNet the stream freezes when doing bitrate switch. Further inquiring with Akamai support, they mentioned that keyframes are not being aligned in multiple bitrates of streams.

I am using PushPublish plugin to push the stream to akamai and already set these properties as mentioned else where in the forum :

publisher.setAdaptiveStreaming(true);
publisher.setSendOriginalTimecodes(true);
publisher.setOriginalTimecodeThreshold(0x100000);

Apart from this I have enabled sortBuffer and tried with different values in sortBuffer from 750 to 1500. When I check the logs I can see that all the streams are properly aligned :

INFO server comment - LiveReceiver.keyframe[live/_definst_/anupam_808997649_media_240p]: dts:1405503343309 pts:1405503343309
INFO server comment - LiveReceiver.keyframe[live/_definst_/anupam_808997649_media_720p]: dts:1405503343309 pts:1405503343309
INFO server comment - LiveReceiver.keyframe[live/_definst_/anupam_808997649_media_360p]: dts:1405503343309 pts:1405503343309
INFO server comment - LiveReceiver.keyframe[live/_definst_/anupam_808997649_media_240p]: dts:1405503346312 pts:1405503346312
INFO server comment - LiveReceiver.keyframe[live/_definst_/anupam_808997649_media_720p]: dts:1405503346312 pts:1405503346312
INFO server comment - LiveReceiver.keyframe[live/_definst_/anupam_808997649_media_360p]: dts:1405503346312 pts:1405503346312
INFO server comment - LiveReceiver.keyframe[live/_definst_/anupam_808997649_media_240p]: dts:1405503349315 pts:1405503349315
INFO server comment - LiveReceiver.keyframe[live/_definst_/anupam_808997649_media_360p]: dts:1405503349315 pts:1405503349315
INFO server comment - LiveReceiver.keyframe[live/_definst_/anupam_808997649_media_720p]: dts:1405503349315 pts:1405503349315
INFO server comment - LiveReceiver.keyframe[live/_definst_/anupam_808997649_media_360p]: dts:1405503352318 pts:1405503352318
INFO server comment - LiveReceiver.keyframe[live/_definst_/anupam_808997649_media_240p]: dts:1405503352318 pts:1405503352318
INFO server comment - LiveReceiver.keyframe[live/_definst_/anupam_808997649_media_720p]: dts:1405503352318 pts:1405503352318
INFO server comment - LiveReceiver.keyframe[live/_definst_/anupam_808997649_media_240p]: dts:1405503355321 pts:1405503355321
INFO server comment - LiveReceiver.keyframe[live/_definst_/anupam_808997649_media_360p]: dts:1405503355321 pts:1405503355321
INFO server comment - LiveReceiver.keyframe[live/_definst_/anupam_808997649_media_720p]: dts:1405503355321 pts:1405503355321
INFO server comment - LiveReceiver.keyframe[live/_definst_/anupam_808997649_media_360p]: dts:1405503358324 pts:1405503358324
INFO server comment - LiveReceiver.keyframe[live/_definst_/anupam_808997649_media_240p]: dts:1405503358324 pts:1405503358324
INFO server comment - LiveReceiver.keyframe[live/_definst_/anupam_808997649_media_720p]: dts:1405503358324 pts:1405503358324
INFO server comment - LiveReceiver.keyframe[live/_definst_/anupam_808997649_media_240p]: dts:1405503361327 pts:1405503361327
INFO server comment - LiveReceiver.keyframe[live/_definst_/anupam_808997649_media_720p]: dts:1405503361327 pts:1405503361327
INFO server comment - LiveReceiver.keyframe[live/_definst_/anupam_808997649_media_360p]: dts:1405503361327 pts:1405503361327
INFO server comment - LiveReceiver.keyframe[live/_definst_/anupam_808997649_media_360p]: dts:1405503364330 pts:1405503364330
INFO server comment - LiveReceiver.keyframe[live/_definst_/anupam_808997649_media_240p]: dts:1405503364330 pts:1405503364330
INFO server comment - LiveReceiver.keyframe[live/_definst_/anupam_808997649_media_720p]: dts:1405503364330 pts:1405503364330
INFO server comment - LiveReceiver.keyframe[live/_definst_/anupam_808997649_media_240p]: dts:1405503367333 pts:1405503367333
INFO server comment - LiveReceiver.keyframe[live/_definst_/anupam_808997649_media_720p]: dts:1405503367333 pts:1405503367333
INFO server comment - LiveReceiver.keyframe[live/_definst_/anupam_808997649_media_360p]: dts:1405503367333 pts:1405503367333
INFO server comment - LiveReceiver.keyframe[live/_definst_/anupam_808997649_media_720p]: dts:1405503370336 pts:1405503370336
INFO server comment - LiveReceiver.keyframe[live/_definst_/anupam_808997649_media_240p]: dts:1405503370336 pts:1405503370336
INFO server comment - LiveReceiver.keyframe[live/_definst_/anupam_808997649_media_360p]: dts:1405503370336 pts:1405503370336

When I contacted Akamai support, they are mentioning that keyframe received are not aligned and, the Wowza version which is certified by them is 3.6.2, here is the excerpts from the mail which I received from the Akamai support :

fact that pointed Wowza version 4.0.3 is not qualified with Akamai and so might not work as expected. Latest qualified version of Wowza is 3.6.2.

Encoder can be qualified by its vendoer and vendors are aware of the paths that need to be taken to complete that.

So, My question here is, is there any way I can get Wowza version 4.. to be qualified to work with Akamai, or should I downgrade to version 3.6.2 to make this work?

Thanks,

Anupam

2

Anupam,

First, you are lumping together or confusing ABR key frame alignment and audio/video sync.

The SortBuffer and dts/pts numbers are to do with a/v sync. publisher.setAdaptiveStreaming() is regarding key frame alignment.

As a test, I would try disabling the 720p push. The problem may be upstream bandwidth between your Wowza server and Akamai. The 720p rendition is the highest bitrate of course, so remove that and see if the others are now aligned. You may need more capacity to accommodate all the renditions.

Richard

3

Anupam,

I have heard that Akamai at least recommends a Wowza 3x version because of some internal process of testing and approval, but there is no other reason and you would be better to use the current version of Wowza, and stay updated with patches.

Richard

4

Akamai has told me that they only fully support 3.6.2 and it has made working with them difficult. How does one go about finding the 3.6.2 version of the Wowza software?

5

Anupam,

First, you are lumping together or confusing ABR key frame alignment and audio/video sync.

The SortBuffer and dts/pts numbers are to do with a/v sync. publisher.setAdaptiveStreaming() is regarding key frame alignment.

As a test, I would try disabling the 720p push. The problem may be upstream bandwidth between your Wowza server and Akamai. The 720p rendition is the highest bitrate of course, so remove that and see if the others are now aligned. You may need more capacity to accommodate all the renditions.

Richard

Thanks Richard, I am sorry I got confused, i set up sort buffer to remove the A/V sync, i am running Wowza Instance on AWS and I have enough upstream bandwidth to support all the renditions. Apart from that, I am more concerned about Akamai asking me to downgrade the Wowza to 3.6.2, is this recommended solution by Wowza as well, or can you tell me how to further debug this issue?

Regards,

Anupam

6

Any one?