Windows Media Player (WMP) 6.4 on WinNT - http streaming

[kjo]

I have been playing around with using VLC 0.7.2 to transcode DirectShow input video/audio and then streaming it to Windows Media Player (WMP) over http. Thanks to some of the hints and suggestions from the forums, I've had some success. Here are the setup parameters that have worked best for me:

Stream Output Format - http
Container/MUX Format - asf
Video Formats - WMV2 and DIV3
Video Bit Rates - 128kbps and 192 kbps
Audio Formats - MP3
Audio Bit Rates - 32kbps
Video Scale Factor - 0.5

This works great when the receiving PC is running WMP 9.0 on Windows 2000 or Windows 98SE.

Here's my problem: I cannot view the same stream when the receiving PC is running WMP 6.4 on Windows NT. I get the following error message: The specified stream type is not recognized. (Error=C00D07E2)

Does anyone have any suggestions?

Thanks,

kjo


Source PC Configuration Details:

I have a Canopus ADVC-1394 capture card that shows up as an OHCI compliant 1394 device to the operating system. The ADVC-1394 takes in any analog Video/Audio source and presents it to the OS as OHCI-compliant Firewire Card connected to a DigitalVideo (DV) device. I am running Windows 2000 Advanced Server on a Dell PowerEdge 600SC Server, Pentium 4 2.4Mhz with 384Meg of RAM.

[markfm]

Most likely because you're using ASF -- ASF is a newer container format, I believe it didnt come out until the newer version of WMP. Try selecting AVI for Encapsulation method, instead of ASF.

I'm not sure, but you may also need to stick to WMV1 or WMV2 -- not sure if the earlier WMP handles DIV3 (what video CODECs it supported).

[kjo]

markfm,

I thought that AVI was not meant for streaming, i.e., it is only valid as a file format. Even it was valid for streaming, VLC does not support AVI muxing combined with the http output method. See the following URL:

http://www.videolan.org/streaming/features.html

But just to make sure, I tried it anyway. Unfortunately, it does not work with WMP 9.0/Win2000 or WMP 6.4/WinNT.

Thanks for the suggestion though,

kjo

[markfm]

Apologies -- I work with a self-compiled VLC, the latest pre-0.7.3 from Subversion.

In that case a .AVI encapsulated stream does work fine, at least with WMP9. Right now I am watching a test clip -- I have VLC serving mmsh, to address 127.0.0.1 (localhost), port 8080. I open WMP, then do a File -- Open URL. I plug in mms://my_PC_IP_address:8080, and WMP does a connect and starts displaying the streamed file.

This definitely doesn't work with at least some earlier VLC versions -- I tried for 5 minutes before going "Duh", and switching to my current build of the code.

[kjo]

markfm,

Thanks for the clarification regarding the releases of VLC (0.7.2 vs. 0.7.3). When VLC 0.7.3 becomes available, I'll give it a try.

No need to apologize. On the contrary, you've given me something to look forward to - VLC 0.7.3 !

Thanks again,

kjo

[kjo]

One more follow-up . . .

If I change the output method in VLC 0.7.2 to mmsh (instead of http) and the muxer/container format to AVI, then I can view the stream on WMP 9.0/Win2000. Unfortunately, it still does not work with WMP 6.4/WinNT.

kjo