Is IPTV pure hype?!?!

[nameta9]

I was reading some articles on the "future" of TVIP, that is TV over the internet. Is this stuff for real ?

 

How on earth can a tv signal be broadcast over the internet? I think this is a case of really PURE HYPE! A tv signal needs at least 4MHZ bandwidth so if 1000 people over the internet want to see that station (from anywhere in the world) the tv station server would have to send the digital IP packets at 4GHZ! and what if all of a sudden 10,000 people wanted to see the station? then the TVIP server would have to send the signal at 40GHZ! THAT TO ME SOUNDS LIKE PURE HYPE!!!

[Douglas]

I guess I don't get the connection between the bandwidth of the signal and the number of people tuning in.

[Ophiolite]

nameta9, you don't seem to appreciate the advances in all computation and transmission technologies. I simply observe that fifteen years ago a 1.4Mb floppy was huge. Hard drives were big at 40Mb. And thirty years ago you could program a multi-sensor input monitoring system in 8kb (sixteen bit words at that). So, I have zero doubt that that is the future - not hype.

[Phi for All]

Since the FCC is considering allowing broadcasters in the US to stop using analog bandwidths, people will need something to replace their television antennae. Unfortunately, the folks who still use analog aren't always able to switch to cable or internet. I'm sure the technology will be here soon.

[Dave]

What I would hope that the TV companies start to do is to use things like p2p to facilitate the release of their programmes. Bittorrent is a really good technology for getting large amounts of data out to people efficiently. It's already going on all over the place; all they need do is offer some kind of legal aspect to it, and they'll bag themselves a whole lot of money.

[Ophiolite]

Since the FCC is considering[/b'] allowing broadcasters in the US to stop using analog bandwidths,

Whereas, in the UK, the government is requiring the use of digital transmissions. Analog will have ceased to be, in the UK, by December 31, 2012.

[osuman]

I think you're getting signal bandwidth a little confused with network traffic, either way...

 

Multicast packets eliminate the problem with the amount of needed bandwidth increasing linearly with the number of users.

 

Last I knew, most back-bone network equipment doesn't route said packets, but I'm sure it's only a matter of time...

[Guest cipher]

Nothing's impossible, all that needs to be done is to just use a new method of transfering digital video over the internet.

[drz]

http://www.winamp.com

 

they've been doing it for a while. It is not the best quality, but there are pay services that advertise good quality.

 

Everything is going net based now though, telephones, tv, radio, and I just saw a commercial for a sprint phone that allowed you to view tv.

 

A likely TVIP system would be p2p, like kazaa, or, skype, as p2p is about the best transfer method out there.

[flyboy]

i watch tv on the internet but the quality sucks

so i stopped