Streaming Video

[Ebra]

Anybody ever set up a server to stream video across there network?

[EvilCabbage]

What exactly do you want to do with it?

Ive helped setting up some MS Mediaplayer server thingos before, but if you tell us exactly what you want the end result to be, then we can point you in some directions.

ie: is it for security, entertainment, how many users, etc..etc..

[Ebra]

Ok I work for a school district and they want to put all the videos that they have in the libary on one server and have the teacher go that server in stead of check in the video out of the libary.

[EvilCabbage]

Ahhh.. Okie dokie. Not actually streaming it, so much as just storing the videos on a network server.

So, as I understand it, you want to take the videos they have, and digitise them?

For this simple, yet time consuming task, you will need:
- Video capture gear. Creative do some reasonable kits, I myself use a Creative MovieMaker package.
- A decent network connection. 100Mbps is an absolute *must*
- Lots (and I mean lots of storage space.

I would capture the videos (very time consuming, and it may even violate some copyright law, you will need to check that out first) and store them in an easy to read format. Avi, or Mpeg. It would need to also be in a decent quality, which is very space consuming. I just captured 100 minutes of video this afternoon, in good quality, and Ive ended up with a 2.04 gig file.

Working out how much storage space needs to be available is the next port of call. Find out how many hours of footage they want stored, and a good ratio to work: for every hour of footage, they need 1 gig of storage. And this needs to be fast storage too, if they want to be pulling videos off it.

Then, you just need to give them read access to the video data store, have it catalogued as they wish (ie: a directory for history, math, english, etc..) so they can access it, and play the videos from their desktops. Alternatively, if it is a small video, they might be able to temporarily copy it to the desktop to play, but this would again raise legal copyright issues.

If I was going to do it, lets say I would have around 20 hours of footage to catalogue at the start.

If you can give me some idea of budget, there may be other recommendations, but I urge you to check out the legal issues before making any big plans.

Cheerio.
-Cameron "Video Pimp" Jones.

[Ebra]

not real sure what the budget is going to be yet they just told us that they want to see some prices on something like this.

[EvilCabbage]

We just purchased a Snap Server for around $3000 Australian. Capacity of 160GB, with an inbuilt 100Mbps network adapter. This is probably the most cost effective way to store the data, with the unit probably costing around the $1600 US mark. Extremely easy unit to setup and maintain.

Then of course, factor in your time to set it up, and I would imagine you could factor in a few hours of tutorial time, to teach them how to capture the video, unless they want you to capture all of it, which could get expensive for them :)

Again, this would depend on how much footage they want to capture, but a general idea might be:

$1700 (over estimate) for a Snap Server
$500 (over estimate again) for video capture gear
plus whatever labour you wish to include.

Not really a super expensive thing to setup, but very time consuming (ie: if they have 20 hours of footage, expect to spend 60 hours capturing it all)

Let me know if you have any more questions dude.

[Ebra]

Thanks for the info Ill probaly have some more questions here pretty soon

[EvilCabbage]

No worries dude / dudette.

You can also get a hold of me at:

cameron.jones@auriongold.com.au