Real Video - A Popular Streaming Video Format From RealNetworks
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RealNetworks is a company based in Seattle, USA, which provides Internet media delivery software and services. The company is recognized for the development and poularity of RealAudio, which is a compressed audio media format, Real Video, which is a compressed video media format, and RealPlayer, which is a media player that supports both RealAudio and RealVideo. All these three are quite a rage with the Gen-X. The company also provides entertainment services online, such as Rhapsody and RealArcade. RealPlayer supports various multimedia formats such as mp3, MPEG-4, Quicktime, etc., and it also supports multiple versions of RealAudio and RealVideo. RealVideo was first developed in 1997 and at that time it was based on the H.263 codec. This changed to a proprietary video codec, with the introduction of Real8 version of RealPlayer. Many platforms such as Windows, Macintosh, Linux, and various cell phones support the RealVideo format. RealVideo is generally matched with RealAudio and compressed in a RealMedia container. It is RealMedia that gets viewed, while it is being transferred over the network. As this transfer takes place in streaming media format, one can watch live TV, as download of the real video in advance is not a prerequisite.
RealVideo may be played from a RealMedia file or it could also be streamed over using the Real Time Streaming Protocol (RTSP). RTSP is used by RealNetworks only at the time of set up and management of the connection, but the actual video is transferred through the use of their own Reliable Data Transfer (RDT) protocol. This is cited as a major drawback, as it makes it tough to use RealVideo with any other player and server software. However, now, M Player has developed a project which has the ability to play RTD streams.
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Constant bit rate encoding is generally used by RealVideo players. This is done to make real time streaming easy. RealNetworks has very recently come up with a variable bit rate format known as Real Media Variable BitRate (RVBR). This variable bit rate ensures a better video quality, but it makes streaming difficult as it becomes tough to guess the network capacity that a video stream would need. A video, which has scenes that change quickly, would need a higher bit rate. If the increase in the bit rate of a video stream is significant, the data would be transferred at a higher speed, and thus it would lead to an interruption in the video.
The most recent version of (RealPlayer and) RealVideo is 10 and is currently supported by several platforms such as Windows and Linux. There are other players such as MPlayer and Real Alternative, that use the same DLLs that the official RealPlayer uses to play real video media, and so, this makes the installation of RealPlayer mandatory to use these other two players.
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