SERVERS... Does anyone know about them?

Hi does anybody know how to start up a site so i can stream large ammounts of video? i mean to start off with, jus thousands of viewers, if you can help i am willing to pay, can i get cheap servers? i dont know a great deal about it, id appreciate the help!!:cool

 

Hi there, one option might be to rent yourself a server space on-line, they can be quite cheap and have super fast connections which if you are planning to stream to multiple destinations might be the way forward for you. Using a connection at your home would probably be too slow as your upload speed is most likely very low if you're using a domestic connection from an ISP.

As for servers, these days with the advent of virtual software allowing you to install more than one fully working machine on you desktop you can install and use several servers without the need for all that expensive hardware or electric!!
I have a windows 7 dell laptop 1545 running a MS 2003 server, an XP and another windows 7 machine all running in side of software called Virtual Box from Sun Microsystems.

The only Limit is How much RAM you have and the speed of your CPU
Hope this answers more questions than it raises !

 

You need to know that streaming to "thousands of viewers" will require a substantial network connection. In order for people to stream FROM your server it needs to have adequate upload speed. Most broadband internet connections have good download speed but limited upload speed. My Comcast connection is 12mbps download and 3mbps upload. If I had five people streaming from my location at the same time, my connection would be overburdened.

For what you propose, a hosted, dedicated server would probably be required. You might get by with a virtual server but then your sharing the physical internet connection with other users.

Most hosting companies are on symmetrical optical connections meaning the upload and download speeds are the same unlike residential and normal business class broadband connections.

If money is no object, you could possibly get your own optical connection but they are very very expensive. An OC48 connection for example would be several thousand dollars per month.

 

Its a good point about the physical Network connection, I have had more fun with a good desktop running the whole shebang on a Linux Install with 2 NIC's using the software raid to stripe two 120 gb sata drives and having hardware virtualisation

shnerdly How about some help over my way :-[

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