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Hi guys, 😀 Sorry I have not been on the site lately. You know work and all. But I have been getting everything ready for my station.(slow but sure). My question is, which web site hosting company is the best? I want to use live365 or something like that. In my other business I use register.com’s cheap 5 page site. I emailed them and they said I would have to get there commercial one so I can stream live audio. I guess what I am asking is what is the cheapest way to go? 😕 Sticklizard
Total posts : 45366Go to Loudcity ([url]http://www.loudcity.com[/url]) and check them out. I started on Live365 and got an occasional listener. After moving to Loudcity for licensing and Audiorealm for streaming, I have listeners every day. Right now, I don’t get a lot of listeners, but someone is listening for a long time in most cases.
Unlike Live365, Loudcity doesn’t host. They only handle licensing. You have to use another source for streaming. But, unlike Live 365, there is no logging in to listen and there are no ads.
The Loudcity method is a bit more expensive than Live365, but you don’t encounter the ‘log into Live365’ resistance.
Total posts : 45366If you are skilled in system administration type stuff:
You can find whats called a “Community Colo” in your town, or large city nearby (if you live in tinytown).They will host for free or for a small donation.
I have my own servers in one in Silly-Con Valley, and I donate 50.00 per month. I setup my own stream server (shoutcast), and run websites from there.
Right now, livehardrock.com is running about 200 streams from that machine…
Total posts : 45366Thanks, I will check all this out. :D, I have learned so much from you guys on this web site. I still consider myself a newby, but I hope some day to answer another newby’s question on this forum. Thanks again, Sticklizard
Total posts : 45366Here’s a link to a colo in Seattle: [url]http://www.seaccp.org/[/url].
Total posts : 45366i use http://www.streamsolutions.co.uk
seems ok to us!
Total posts : 45366Ahh , why dont you stream from you own connection.. IF your streaming, you have a full time connection, unless you getting lots of connections..
I stream on my DSL, using shoutcast and AACplus (aac plus can do better than FM quality at 32kbs) I dont get huge listener number at any given time..but it works and works very well.. I get a great quality stream at 20kbs and cost me nothing extra..
configuration is pretty simple..
set up a computer with winamp and shoutcast, and in your router open a port and forward it to the computer with shoutcast running on it..Oh and one other tip, if you want more listeners, server on port 443.. 443 is the SSL port and all firewalls allow traffic out of it for ordering onlin, it doesnt effect yor ability to surf or order or the listeners ability.. Why do this??.. many listeners at work are blocked from using odd ports like 8000 or others by there workplace fiirewall.. If you look at the big stations on shoutcast.com there on port 80 or another common open port like 443..
I server on 443 so that i can listen from work if i like.. works perfect..
If you look at shoutcast.com you will see that AACplus is becomming very very common, it will only be a short amount of time that Windows media player and others suppport it.. AACplus is the future format of streaming media.. the newest winamp is all setup for AACplus..
Soon we should start seeing AACplus on portable mp3 players ect becuase a song will take less than half the space of the memory… Think of how many hours of music a 20 gig I pod will hold when each song takes up half the space.
Now if you not very computer savy this may not be a option , but if you are.. go for it..
Much indfo on how to setup can be found on shoutcast.com
Jason
Total posts : 45366Regarding the running of a Shoutcast server from your home connection, keep in mind that while technically possible, this may violate your ISPs terms of service. Most residential ISP services prohibit the operation of servers, as they claim it can degrade the network for their other subscribers.
Of course, they are happy to sell you a business level of service at double to triple the cost, probably on the same equipment.
Another thing to keep in mind is that using an ISP like DSL and especially cable, your total number of listeners will be low as compared to what a server running with a high-bandwidth connection can do. Your “up speed” is limited, and each listener will consume a certain amount of that. After a while, all the bandwidth is used up and streaming quits working.
Regards,
Scott
Soon to be on the air in Omaha, Nebraska
Total posts : 45366Great discussion on streaming here, and lots of good input. Here’s a bit more info on streaming from your home connection.
I agree that most ISPs will flip out if you are doing any heavy lifting from home, but how they react and what the limits are can be difficult to discern.
I have been lightly streaming from my Comcast connection for three years, and so far, everything has been working OK. There have been a few bumps and bruises, and a few provisos, so here’s what it’s been like so far.
I started with an app called Streamer using Oddcast and Winamp. I used an old PC 233 box and WIN 98 and streamed 20 kbps mono of garage band/independents with no ASCAP/BMI issues to worry about. This also means the stream wasn’t that popular, ’cause I wasn’t playin’ the hits, so that kept traffic low.
When that box died I switched to a 166 running WinMedia encoder 7.0 and an 8 kbps stream of my part 15 xmtr. I have very little in the way of listener loads, it’s mostly a novelty, and a way for me to check my transmitter when I’m away from home – I currently stream from an AM radio that receives my station, and the radio is the source for my streaming server, not my audio chain, so there’s that.
I did buy the multiple IP upgrade from comcast ($5.95 for up to 5 different IPs), so I could connect my streaming PCs directly rather than use a router. I suspect that allows for significant additional bandwidth use, as the expectation on the ISP end is that there will be more users and more traffic.
I did not try to get a static IP, and I’ve found that as long as the PC is on and connected the IP doesn’t change very much. In fact, while on and connected my IP only changed once in three years, when Comcast bought some other outfit back east and started using a different server farm for my location.
The IP will change if the PC has been up for a long time and then is taken off line. I’ve always had a new IP after a restart with more than three months on line.
I deal with this by simply changing the IP # in my HTML link to the “listen live” link on my web page, and this process could be further simplified with a little javascript, but I’ve been too lazy to implement it.
If you want to stream guild property like BMI/ASCAP stuff, you can use one of several services that have popped up that bundle the rights fees and bandwith fees into a single monthly payment, but you probably want to have some kind of revenue coming in to pay for that as it adds up fast.
For non-guild works like garage/independents I would suggest trying a home server just to learn more about how it works. It’s really cool to have the box on your premises, and being able to play with the different serving and encoding technologies is fun.
At today’s hardware prices you can probably build a light duty server for next to nothing, as a sub-gigHz box and small HD with a moderate amount of ram and a nice sound card will probably get you started.
If your stream gets so popular the bandwidth becomes a problem, well, congratulations!!!
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