| Author |
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Per Hansen
Guest
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 Posted:
Tue May 31, 2005 3:23 pm Post subject:
Multiple bitrates not working in WMP for OS X |
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I've got a clip encoded in 3 different bitrates. Using WMP 9 for OS X
the WMP seems to always select the lowest bitrate. Maybe WMP for OS X
does not support multiple bitrates?
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Neil Smith [MVP Digital M
Guest
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| Posted:
Tue May 31, 2005 4:12 pm Post subject:
Re: Multiple bitrates not working in WMP for OS X |
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On 31 May 2005 03:23:16 -0700, "Per Hansen"
<phh332-news2343243@yahoo.co.uk> wrote:
| Quote: | I've got a clip encoded in 3 different bitrates. Using WMP 9 for OS X
the WMP seems to always select the lowest bitrate. Maybe WMP for OS X
does not support multiple bitrates?
|
Could be. What are your network settings - auto, or have you set a
specific network type (like ADSL or LAN rather than Dialup).
Also - you know, that negotiation really only takes place when the
file's hosted on a streaming server so it may not work on your local
machine and it certainly won't work from a web server.
I can check it out later if you like, I got a mac mini the other week
so it's testable now.
Cheers - Neil |
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Per Hansen
Guest
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| Posted:
Wed Jun 01, 2005 2:10 pm Post subject:
Re: Multiple bitrates not working in WMP for OS X |
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| Quote: | Could be. What are your network settings - auto, or have you set a
specific network type (like ADSL or LAN rather than Dialup).
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The player is set to T1 as the network connection speed. The clip is
served
via http port 80 from a WMS sitting on the same LAN.
| Quote: | Also - you know, that negotiation really only takes place when the
file's hosted on a streaming server so it may not work on your local
machine and it certainly won't work from a web server.
|
Yep, it's hosted on a streaming server. It's an on-demand publishing
point that I have created on the WMS.
| Quote: | I can check it out later if you like, I got a mac mini the other week
so it's testable now.
|
Thanks, that's very kind of you.
The clip I am using to test is encoded in 3 different bitrates, I just
checked. The different bitrates works if I in Windows manually adjust
the connection settings in the windows media player. Set this to modem
for example and I get a 35kbps bitrate, set it to LAN and I get
241kbps.
Regards,
Per Hansen
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Neil Smith [MVP Digital M
Guest
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| Posted:
Thu Jun 02, 2005 12:30 am Post subject:
Re: Multiple bitrates not working in WMP for OS X |
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On 1 Jun 2005 02:10:28 -0700, "Per Hansen"
<phh332-news2343243@yahoo.co.uk> wrote:
| Quote: | Could be. What are your network settings - auto, or have you set a
specific network type (like ADSL or LAN rather than Dialup).
The player is set to T1 as the network connection speed. The clip is
served
via http port 80 from a WMS sitting on the same LAN.
Also - you know, that negotiation really only takes place when the
file's hosted on a streaming server so it may not work on your local
machine and it certainly won't work from a web server.
Yep, it's hosted on a streaming server. It's an on-demand publishing
point that I have created on the WMS.
I can check it out later if you like, I got a mac mini the other week
so it's testable now.
Thanks, that's very kind of you.
The clip I am using to test is encoded in 3 different bitrates, I just
checked. The different bitrates works if I in Windows manually adjust
the connection settings in the windows media player. Set this to modem
for example and I get a 35kbps bitrate, set it to LAN and I get
241kbps.
|
OK so I made a multiple bitrate, CBR file using 1720kbps + 310kbps +
42kbps as the available bitrates. Dropped that onto the media server
and started the publishing point. I also made sure I was running full
logging on that publishing point.
I can confirm your results on Mac OSX10.4 Tiger using WMP9.0.0.3077 vs
Win2000 using WMP9.0.0.3250. Both clients were connected to the mms
publishing point with no proxying.
I also know *why* this is happening and I don't think there's an easy
fix : If you look at your server logs, check the lines where Macs make
a connection. The last 4 items are the areas to focus on. What you
have is (in order) :
cs-media-name c-max-bandwidth cs-media-rate s-proxied
After cs-media name, do you notice that for Mac clients, that value is
empty (a dash or - character). For windows clients, there's a value
there, which corresponds to the bandwidth peak selected in network
settings.
It looks like Mac WMP9 doesn't report that value and I'm guessing that
is the one used by the media server to determine the stream bitrate
peak which it will send, given multiple bitrate files. Bad call by MS
I guess. There *is* also an average bandwidth value in the logfiles
but I reckon that's calculated when the stream is closed and the log
entry is made.
So about all you can do is (maybe) detect the mac client, and offer
them a manual selection of a single bitrate file appropriate to their
needs. Possibly you can do this with script and a short dummy file
I'll try on the weekend to see if I can embed a player in Mac+IE or
Mac+Safari because if other player properties are available then
player.network.maxBandwidth ought to report the chosen value - if it
doesn't (on Mac) then that's probably the culprit ;-p
HTH
Cheers - Neil |
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Per Hansen
Guest
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| Posted:
Tue Jun 07, 2005 3:48 pm Post subject:
Re: Multiple bitrates not working in WMP for OS X |
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Neil Smith [MVP Digital Media] wrote:
| Quote: | After cs-media name, do you notice that for Mac clients, that value is
empty (a dash or - character). For windows clients, there's a value
there, which corresponds to the bandwidth peak selected in network
settings.
It looks like Mac WMP9 doesn't report that value and I'm guessing that
is the one used by the media server to determine the stream bitrate
peak which it will send, given multiple bitrate files. Bad call by MS
|
Aha, now that would make sense. I have previously tested streaming from
London to LA and the clients who were using OS X only ever got the very
lowest bitrate. I thought that was a bit odd.
Thanks for checking this Neil. It really never occurred to me to take a
look
at that flag in the logs, I would not have noticed this I think. Is
this issue
something that you could possibly report to the developers at
Microsoft?
| Quote: | So about all you can do is (maybe) detect the mac client, and offer
them a manual selection of a single bitrate file appropriate to their
needs. Possibly you can do this with script and a short dummy file
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I think for the time being I will simply set up 3 presets in the
windows media encoder, each offering different bitrates. When we know
someone is using OS X we will start off with the highest bitrate and
then reduce accordingly if this does not work. |
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