tech requirements of a live web cam ???

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Are most live webcams delayed somewhat ? Or actually taped.

It depends on many factors. Here are few of them
1) Size of the video. Usually 320x200, but sometimes for free modes webcam site owners uses less resolution.
2) Quality of webcam hardware. Different quality has different commpression effeciene\y
3) Quality of encoding/compression alghoritms. It could be jpeg-based like firecracker, xblive, or MPEG based like amsterdamlivexxx or WebVideo
4) Connection speed of your performers/chathosts. As better connection they have as more your server need to accept
5) Sound encoding alghrithm. It also uses your bandwidth
6) How many system/textchat messages transferring via protocol of your webcam software

Usually sound takes about 1-2KB/sec, video is about 6KB/frame, text and system messages are not much. If your performer sending data on 5 fps, that is 30KB + 2KB sound, 32 KB/sec. It is 32KB/sec * 8 = 256Kbps + ~10% to that, because protocol is not using 100%.

That is ~280Kbps per performer.

If you like 100 performers to work on 5 fps and they can send that speed then you need 28Mbps connection minimum and it should work stable. Not really easy to find such provider, but about 20-30 performers is a real thing

Why is it multiplied by 8 in your calculation? Assuming 8 people are watching ?

I am only having 1 performer at a time with up to 100 people watching.


Is there anyway for me to upload to my webhost and then it upload to all my customers with only a 5 second selay or something like that?

8 bit = 1 byte

About delay... It will always be delay and delay is sum of few things:
1) Time for ping from your performer to your host.
2) Time for ping from your host to your client.
3) Data buffering
4) Delay to record sound
The lowest delay on good connection is about 0.5-0.7 seconds, that is only for ping time. Data buffering has various sets.

Our software (WebVideo) has 2 solutions for video transfer :
1) JPEG based frames. Using it we have delay about 1.5-2 seconds
2) MPEG based video. It has delay about 3-5 seconds.

StreamRay software has delay more than 5 seconds. XBlive and firecracker less tha 5 seconds.

Thanks,
Dmitry

The amount of people who can view your webcam depends on the upload connection.

There is no way you would be able to support 100 viewers from a home connection, so your other option (from what you are describing) is Windows Media.

Your local camera runs and is plugged into a computer running Windows Media Encoder. You then sign up with a Windows Media Host (shameless plug - someone like myself) who takes the IP and port and then streams this from my server.

Since my server is in a datacenter it can take whatever upload bandwidith is required, I give you the mms:// stream address for everyone to watch the show and calculate the bandwidth. Each server can handle about 2000 broadband connections.

Good luck with your site

support (@) reddotmedia.net

ummm....I think you are just a little incorrect.
your home connection has nothing to do with how many people can watch a live video unless you are running the video server from the home computer.

the amount of people who can watch depends on the software being used.

as for his question, how much bandwidth can 100 people pull down, well thats going to depend on their connection speed or on if you have the server to limit how much a person can pull down.

I have seen on my server 20 people pull down 3 Megs per second.

the amount of people who can watch depends on the software being used

which software do you use?

it all depends on your stream, i run 28-30 fps with full audio, so its a bit more on the bandwidth but worth the price... back when i did refresh cams i had it refreshing every 3-4 seconds at each image 13-16k each, but i would go with streaming with audio, even better go a step higher and have streaming with audio and no delay made that change and wouldnt go back to 15-30 second delay