Bottleneck busters
Article Abstract:
All video servers have the same general technical problem to address, no matter what market they are targeting: how to move digital video to a viewer from storage. Currently, storage costs are significant for video servers since video, even with the most sophisticated compression, takes up a lot of space. Industry experts contend that ultimately a variety of storage formats are likely to be used for video. Currently, all options have trade-offs. For example, CD-ROM is slower than magnetic-platter drives. Users will find that multi-gigabyte capacity is available today, but the technology does not exist to get video off disks at a fast enough rate. The first bottleneck that is typically encountered with video throughput is the drive's data transfer rate. Industry experts are debating whether software solutions can address this problem, but one option being investigated is massively parallel architectures.
Publication Name: Newmedia
Subject: Computers and office automation industries
ISSN: 1060-7188
Year: 1995
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Set-tops go on trial
Article Abstract:
Several companies are providing digital set-top boxes, responding to a call from Bell Atlantic for boxes for its interactive TV trial. A digital set-top box contains a microprocessor, graphics hardware and RAM, and it uses a sophisticated operating system. Marketing studies show that the devices will need to be priced at less than $300. In the long-run, the field is potentially very lucrative. The leading vendors include leading makers of analog set-top boxes, such as General Instrument, Scientific Atlanta, Pioneer and Zenith. Analog boxes will continue as a market, along with hybrid digital/analog boxes. Scientific Atlanta has already sold a million units of its own hybrid model, designed for extended pay-per-view services. Other major firms are getting into the market, including Apple, Hewlett-Packard and AT$T.
Publication Name: Newmedia
Subject: Computers and office automation industries
ISSN: 1060-7188
Year: 1995
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Stream on: video servers in the real world
Article Abstract:
The term video server is being used more and more, but it can be difficult to obtain an exact meaning. In addition, the market is still in its infancy; International Data Corp analysts indicate that most video servers have been purchased for trials. Some large-system vendors are positioning mainframes as video servers, while software vendors claim that video-on-demand is a software issue. Microsoft, for example, is creating video-on-demand software that it claims will be able to support up to 10,000 users at one time. A third theory in the video server industry is that interactive TV is all hype beyond the technology to deliver content and that the real market for the technology is in business. Starlight Networks, for example, is focusing solely on education, government and business applications.
Publication Name: Newmedia
Subject: Computers and office automation industries
ISSN: 1060-7188
Year: 1995
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