radio margaritaveille question

reed69 · Post by **reed69** » April 22, 2004 1:49 pm

First of all i have a broadband connection at home and at work and it seems like when i try to listen to RM on the high settings it never streams fluently like it should . i always get like buffering and times when it stops. It seem that when i listen to it on low it works fine but i was just wondering which media type you guys choose to listen to RM with and which one might be the best . I have not tried all of the types . I usually use Windows media player but im thinking of trying mp3 because i hate real player period. Just wondering how you guys usually listen to it and if you experience any problems. Thanks

photogal · Post by **photogal** » April 22, 2004 3:32 pm

I listen on media player-high and it works fine. I have a DSL connection. when I was on dial up it always rebuffered. Once in awhile it will stop and buffer or whatever but its not too bad. I wonder if it does that no matter what you use.

reed69 · Post by **reed69** » April 22, 2004 3:35 pm

I really believe it might because i have tried it on two pretty good connections so im thinking it doesnt matter what your connecting with. I was just wondering if a different format was any better about it than the others.

abbacus · Post by **abbacus** » April 22, 2004 3:38 pm

I always listen to it on media player high settings and it seems to always work fine. However when I do go to my girlfriends apartment which has ethernet it sounds like crap most the time. I think it is because to many people are trying to get too many high feeds at the same time.
In the end though no matter what you have it can still only go so fast. Internet services promote this bandwidth stuff about how fast they can get it to you, well their service only has so much to sell. Its hard to explain but its just a theory anyway.
I am unsure of what I am connected to at my apartment but I am sure its a DSL of some sort.

reed69 · Post by **reed69** » April 22, 2004 3:47 pm

well i know quite a bit about the technology or im at least supposed to because im an IT major haha. Its not so much your personal internet connection , unless you have a cable modem which then envolves how much the people around you are downloading , as it is the actual servers of RM and how much they can handle. I'm thinking that at peak times such as when a live concert is on it would have to be a pretty hard task for that server to handle all of the traffic flawlessly. It is streaming a lot of high bandwith streams which would cause it to have buffer more often. I just going to chalk it up to RM's server's because that is most likely what would cause it. I was just making sure that everyone was kind of experiencing the same thing iwas.

fin5 up · Post by **fin5 up** » April 22, 2004 5:04 pm

I've had better luck with Real Player. The media player always seems to mess up on me.

Playa Hombre · Post by **Playa Hombre** » April 22, 2004 5:44 pm

I usually just plug the high mp3 setting into Winamp and it works fine for the most part, but I've had it crash a few times at both home and work. I blame it on the RM server rather than my connection. Nine times out of ten it seems to work fine.

Fool Button · Post by **Fool Button** » April 22, 2004 6:10 pm

fin5 up wrote:I've had better luck with Real Player. The media player always seems to mess up on me.

Same here...WMP buffers a ton on me....never had a problem with Real Player.

longlinergirl · Post by **longlinergirl** » April 23, 2004 12:24 am

I have dial up...yea my hubby bitches enough about $25 a month for aol...don't get me started...anyway and I use mp3 and have no problems

AlbatrossFlyer · Post by **AlbatrossFlyer** » April 23, 2004 1:19 am

its been great until the last couple of days..... i use iTunes on a Mac w/ a cable modem.

zanth · Post by **zanth** » April 23, 2004 9:23 am

I was recording the show last night, using WMP/high and had a few burps in the stream (on a cable modem). Think I'll use RM next time.

longlinergirl · Post by **longlinergirl** » April 23, 2004 9:26 am

I found this site that has a bunch of old JB concerts (not old Jimmy just old shows)http://buffett.ontheweb.nu/.

sholleran · Post by **sholleran** » April 23, 2004 2:22 pm

If you care about cause, read the first paragraph. If you want to diagnose the problem, go to the second.

Actually, the RM servers are NOT your issue. If that were true you'd have everyone getting your experience, which many do not. RM's broadcast is not "on demand" like when you download software, it's a multicast. The exact same signal is sent out to multiple IP recipients, so adding more listeners is no extra work for the source, much like TV or radio (but different). HOWEVER, that signal "forks" at intermediate servers to go to different parts of the globe. At any of those servers, from the originating one to your PC, if the machine hiccups (ie, memory runs low, a higher priortity thread takes the CPU, etc.) then you get a drop out. What's more, the signal may not all take the same path to your pc, but it all has to arrive & be resequenced & reassembled by your pc, so a slow machine, one with little available memory, or a really full & fragmented harddrive can have trouble keeping up. And if you're using a cable modem, the folks in your neighbor hood all share the same pipe to the cable office, so if anybody takes more than their share you get a stutter. For DSL the line to the phone company is not likely to get cross traffic but generally has much less capacity to begin with.

If you want to find out how "fast" a connection you really have, check out the www.DSLReports.com site, under tools/tests, pick a test site like those available under http://www.broadbandreports.com/stest that will let you know how fast you can talk to the internet, but even if that's good you're subject to the slow PC issues listed above.

Good luck diagnosing this one, there's plenty to keep you busy answering what seems like such an easy question.

Coleman · Post by **Coleman** » April 23, 2004 2:24 pm

Hey y'all this is Coleman from Radio Margaritaville.

There are lots of reasons you might get buffering or poor quality sound or bad connections. They can range from us (radio margaritaville) not having enough server capacity or to lots of activity in your geographic area or just glitches in the switching systems...which do happen often.

We have considered adding more lines, servers and higher streaming rate (for better quality) but all of this increases costs. So, one thought I've had is to offer a membership program for $3-5 to help us cover costs while providing a higher quality stream.

What would y'all think about something like this?
Coleman

zanth · Post by **zanth** » April 23, 2004 2:30 pm

Coleman wrote:Hey y'all this is Coleman from Radio Margaritaville.

There are lots of reasons you might get buffering or poor quality sound or bad connections. They can range from us (radio margaritaville) not having enough server capacity or to lots of activity in your geographic area or just glitches in the switching systems...which do happen often.

We have considered adding more lines, servers and higher streaming rate (for better quality) but all of this increases costs. So, one thought I've had is to offer a membership program for $3-5 to help us cover costs while providing a higher quality stream.

What would y'all think about something like this?
Coleman

Hi Coleman,
First, thanks for checking in on us!!

As for the membership, would that be a one-time deal or how would that work? I'd be willing to lay down a few bucks to get a better stream. Maybe just market this for the shows so others not interested in paying could still enjoy RM for free. Please keep us posted and thanks again

Coleman · Post by **Coleman** » April 23, 2004 2:37 pm

That would be $3-5 per month. We wouldn't make money at this, just cover costs.

I am very interested in feedback on this...

Thanks!
Coleman

zanth · Post by **zanth** » April 23, 2004 2:46 pm

Coleman wrote:That would be $3-5 per month. We wouldn't make money at this, just cover costs.

I am very interested in feedback on this...

Thanks!
Coleman

Ok, put me down as a potential subscriber. Might want to start a new thread just for this. Thanks Coleman!

ph4ever · Post by **ph4ever** » April 23, 2004 2:49 pm

Considering I'm from Dallas, I'm kinda disappointed that RM is out of Houston but proud to see it's got some Texas Ties!!!!!

Coleman · Post by **Coleman** » April 23, 2004 2:56 pm

ph4ever wrote:Considering I'm from Dallas, I'm kinda disappointed that RM is out of Houston but proud to see it's got some Texas Ties!!!!!

I'm from north of Houston. Does that help?

parrottonankle · Post by **parrottonankle** » April 23, 2004 3:32 pm

I, too would be game for the small monthly membership fee. I don't experience too many problems, but if 3-5 dollars a month would help alleviate those few problems, then I would definitely be for it. I have what may be a very stupid question....Does anyone know how long of a delay there is from the time that Jimmy sings the words that it reaches the Radio Margaritaville listener? Not that it is any big deal, I'm just curious. Thanks!

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