Performance

Nine out of ten times when customers ask for support, it is because their live stream has performance issues due to bad uplink connections.

If your source stream can't get to our CDN in a reliable way, then the CDN cannot replicate the stream to your viewers in a reliable way.

An unreliable uplink connection can result in strange behavior in CDNs. For instance, in some cases the stream will buffer and buffer for all viewers. In other cases, some viewers may have a buffering video but viewers on relay servers get no video at all. In other cases, the stream does still work for Flash viewers, but not for iOS viewers, or vice versa. 

A reliable uplink is the most underestimated part in the entire chain, so we can't stress the importance enough. It's better to pay a little more for a reliable connection than to risk the performance of your entire live webcast.

StreamZilla offers an extensive high-speed network that covers the entire EU continent. As soon as your upstream gets into our network, we can guarantee that we can distribute the stream reliably over our CDN cloud and to your viewers.

The challenge is to get your streams in a reliable way into our network. Here are some tips to improve your live streaming performance:

Encoders
Sometimes it's the encoder that cannot handle the load. Never use the encoder for other purposes than encoding. Use a powerful computer, make sure that the CPU load stays below 80%. Encode less simultaneous streams or encode at lower bit rates.

Make sure that your total of encoded upstream connections are at a maximum 66% of the sustained available upstream bandwidth. Remember that our CDN can pull in each stream two times for redundancy reasons! For maximum redundancy, use two encoders via two fully separate uplink connections on redundant power lines.

Also check your encoding settings. For instance for Flash streaming we strongly recommend to use H.264 and AAC encoding instead of VP6 and MP3 encoding. See our live encoding tips FAQ for more details.

Wireless networks
In some cases, a fixed line is hard to arrange. But please do not use wireless connections unless there is absolutely no alternative. WiFi is simply too unreliable. 4G and 3G are even worse. 

Local Network
If your encoder is connected to a local network, make sure that the local network has plenty guaranteed upstream capacity and that other services and traffic consumption does not affect your upstream in any way. Make sure that firewalls and proxy servers do not block your upstream. If we have to pull in a stream, open firewalls and use NAT.

Most LANs and internet connections are used for other purposes as well. Don't share the link with other computers. Don't use the same link for viewing the stream, downloading, P2P or other heavy load processes.

Internet uplink
Most internet connections are asynchronous. Check if the advertised connection capacity is actually the upsteam capacity and not the downstream capacity. 

Most internet connections are heavily overbooked consumer grade instead of business grade. Use a professional, dedicated link if possible. Try multiple ISP's and ask for professional, less overbooked lines.

Advertised capacity is not always actual capacity. Make sure that your uplink has enough actual upstream bandwidth. Test the upstream bandwidth prior to the event to be absolutely sure that you have a reliable connection with enough capacity.

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Did you encode the content correctly? Do not use VBR (Variable Bit Rate) encoding. Do not try to watch HD content over a low bandwidth connection. Make sure that your internet downstream speed is higher than the encoding bit rate. Streams are realtime communication and needs permanent headroom to keep the media player buffer filled.

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Check your playback device. Do you have the latest media playback software installed? Does the device have enough CPU and GPU power to decode and playback the content? Check another playback device if possible.

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Most performance issues occur on limited office networks. Is the network shared with other computers? Are other users filling up the network? Did you test your WiFi connection? Is someone running P2P sharing software? Is someone downloading large files? Can streams be blocked by a firewall or proxy or cache? Contact your network administrator.

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Is this link shared with many other computers? Office, school? Are too many other users filling up the link? Does the link provide enough bandwidth for content to pass? Contact your network administrator. Check another link if possible.

We strongly advice not to broadcast and watch the stream at the same connection.

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Check your ISP NOC page. Does the ISP have backbone, interrouting or peering problems? Consumer grade broadband lines are heavily overbooked. You share the network resources with dozens, maybe even hundreds other customers. Some mobile operators block streaming protocols, although they claim to offer open internet access. Please ask your operator about their streaming policy.

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Check our NOC page. We may be experiencing temporarily issues with a certain network operator or Internet Exchange. When these issues persist, we will start using other routes.

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Did you check all the above points and the issues are not solved? Do a traceroute to our servers from as much PC's and networks as possible and send the results to support@streamzillacdn.com

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