Web Demo Comments

Vincent Croce · January 19th, 2006, 06:00 PM

Matt-
I'm on a cable connection and the vows took me less than 20 secs to buffer and start playing. I didn't think the colors looked washed out at all-the footage looked clean to me. I don't think the 741kbps is too high a bitrate at all--I use 3mbps for my broadband demos and 256kbps for my dial-ups and haven't had any complaints. The transfer speed has so many variables--the time of day is a big factor. Here in CT we just had a couple of days of heavy winds, which took down a bunch of poles and power/cable lines and greatly affected my speeds for a time.
Keep up the good work.
Vin

Dave Wagner · January 19th, 2006, 09:06 PM

Matt,

It played just fine for me. However, I like your watermark. Care to share how you did that?

Thanks!

Matt Trubac · January 19th, 2006, 09:15 PM

Thank You All,

I am in the process of switching to a new host, a local ISP. They have told me to expect much faster connections, especially for local clients - the brides that will be looking!

Don't know what is really going on with all the DNS stuff... so if service is interupted, sorry. It seems to be working so far... I think the domain is pointed to the new host already... but am not sure if this is being redirected through my old host... god knows what will happen when I delete my old hosting account.

As far as the washed out look... I thought the blacks looked a little dark after compression (on a windows pc) so I raised the black output in the Matrox Color Correction filter to 32 instead of 16 before encoding in Windows Media Encoder 9. I thought it looked better on my PC's monitor. It looked worse on my mac, but I am assuming most of my potential clients will be running windows? Those who said it looks washed out. Any chance you are on mac?

This is my first real attempt at creating video for the web.

Thanks Again,
Matt

Craig Terott · January 20th, 2006, 11:55 AM

Yes, I'm on a Mac!

Mike F Smith · January 20th, 2006, 01:23 PM

Matt,

I downloaded one of your ckips. It was as fast as any download on my cable has ever been, so working good!!

Mike

Dan Euritt · January 20th, 2006, 05:23 PM

i was downloading your vid at the max speed of my 'net connection, according to the windows media player stats... 1300kbps, which is plenty fast.

i can't believe some of the cheap prices on bandwidth that you guys have listed out here... pricing has dropped like a rock in just the last year.

at that price point, most of what you are seeing there is typically low quality bandwidth that's capped at a certain speed, and you'd probably be sharing a server with hundreds of other sites... but i'd certainly give it a shot at those rates!!

if you are looking for a price point comparison, i have a couple of sites on my dedicated windows media streaming server, at $167 a month, for 1,200 gigs of bandwidth a month... it's all savvis bandwidth, which is top notch stuff, but at least $30 a month of that is just for the windows 2003 server license rental.

$167 a month seems expensive by comparison, but i only got that rate after months of researching dedicated web server hosts at www.webhostingtalk.com... and i've only had the server for 3(?) months so far, so the rates are fresh... all the websites in my sig file are on another server.

as the cheap bandwidth goes, tho, so shall the dedicated server bandwidth... i may have to re-negotiate my bandwidth limit before too long, lol.

Matt Trubac · January 20th, 2006, 10:30 PM

Glad to hear that things are moving quickly. I switched my hosting over to a local internet service provider. It is shared hosting but it seems like I'm all alone on my server. In my control panel for my site I can view the server status. It always says...

Server Load: 0.00 (4 cpus) -I've seen it up at 2-4 a couple times
Memory Used: fluctuates between 11-12%
Swap Used: 0.00%
Disk sda3 (/): 26%
Disk sda1 (/boot): 12%
Disk sdb1 (/home): 12%

Craig... I do all my editing on mac and I agree the WMV files look a little washed out on the mac. If you switch the gamma over to 2.2 (pc gamma) I think it looks alright. I plan on putting up versions in a format for QT for mac users and those who prefer QT. I'll leave the blacks alone for these.

Sorenson, MPEG-4, or push the technology forward and use H.264?

Thanks,
Matt

Pat Sherman · January 20th, 2006, 10:56 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Matt Trubac

Would anybody who tried this yesterday care to empty their browser cache and try again today? Havn't changed hosts but I have looked into different options. Does anybody use PlayStream? $22.00 for 100MB storage and 4GB transfer / month. 1 cent per Megabyte over the transfer limit.

I currently have the videos on the same host as my website. I get 1000MB storage and 10GB Transfer for $14.95 / month @ Hypermart.net. Maybe it just isn't a good server for a fast continuous download?

Recommendations are welcome!

Thanks,
Matt

One word. 1and1.com

$19.95 a Month
30,000MB Webspace
1.5GB Transfers
50 FTP Accounts
3000 Email Accounts
5 Domains Included
MS Hosting or Linux Hosting

$9.95 a Month
20,000MB Webspace
1.0GB Transfers
25 FTP Accounts
2000 Email Accounts
3 Domains Included
MS Hosting or Linux Hosting

January 19th, 2006, 09:06 PM	#17
Dave Wagner Regular Crew Join Date: Feb 2003 Posts: 28	Web Demo Matt, It played just fine for me. However, I like your watermark. Care to share how you did that? Thanks!

January 19th, 2006, 09:15 PM	#18
Matt Trubac Major Player Join Date: Oct 2003 Location: Grand Rapids, MI Posts: 286	Thanks Thank You All, I am in the process of switching to a new host, a local ISP. They have told me to expect much faster connections, especially for local clients - the brides that will be looking! Don't know what is really going on with all the DNS stuff... so if service is interupted, sorry. It seems to be working so far... I think the domain is pointed to the new host already... but am not sure if this is being redirected through my old host... god knows what will happen when I delete my old hosting account. As far as the washed out look... I thought the blacks looked a little dark after compression (on a windows pc) so I raised the black output in the Matrox Color Correction filter to 32 instead of 16 before encoding in Windows Media Encoder 9. I thought it looked better on my PC's monitor. It looked worse on my mac, but I am assuming most of my potential clients will be running windows? Those who said it looks washed out. Any chance you are on mac? This is my first real attempt at creating video for the web. Thanks Again, Matt __________________ Matt Trubac

January 20th, 2006, 01:23 PM	#20
Mike F Smith Regular Crew Join Date: Oct 2005 Posts: 156	working good Matt, I downloaded one of your ckips. It was as fast as any download on my cable has ever been, so working good!! Mike

January 20th, 2006, 10:30 PM	#22
Matt Trubac Major Player Join Date: Oct 2003 Location: Grand Rapids, MI Posts: 286	Web Host Glad to hear that things are moving quickly. I switched my hosting over to a local internet service provider. It is shared hosting but it seems like I'm all alone on my server. In my control panel for my site I can view the server status. It always says... Server Load: 0.00 (4 cpus) -I've seen it up at 2-4 a couple times Memory Used: fluctuates between 11-12% Swap Used: 0.00% Disk sda3 (/): 26% Disk sda1 (/boot): 12% Disk sdb1 (/home): 12% Craig... I do all my editing on mac and I agree the WMV files look a little washed out on the mac. If you switch the gamma over to 2.2 (pc gamma) I think it looks alright. I plan on putting up versions in a format for QT for mac users and those who prefer QT. I'll leave the blacks alone for these. Sorenson, MPEG-4, or push the technology forward and use H.264? Thanks, Matt __________________ Matt Trubac

January 19th, 2006, 06:00 PM	#16
Vincent Croce Major Player Join Date: Oct 2005 Location: Fort Myers, FL Posts: 263	Matt- I'm on a cable connection and the vows took me less than 20 secs to buffer and start playing. I didn't think the colors looked washed out at all-the footage looked clean to me. I don't think the 741kbps is too high a bitrate at all--I use 3mbps for my broadband demos and 256kbps for my dial-ups and haven't had any complaints. The transfer speed has so many variables--the time of day is a big factor. Here in CT we just had a couple of days of heavy winds, which took down a bunch of poles and power/cable lines and greatly affected my speeds for a time. Keep up the good work. Vin

January 20th, 2006, 11:55 AM	#19
Craig Terott Major Player Join Date: May 2005 Location: Glendale, AZ Posts: 691	Yes, I'm on a Mac!

January 20th, 2006, 05:23 PM	#21
Dan Euritt Trustee Join Date: Mar 2004 Location: Carlsbad CA Posts: 1,132	i was downloading your vid at the max speed of my 'net connection, according to the windows media player stats... 1300kbps, which is plenty fast. i can't believe some of the cheap prices on bandwidth that you guys have listed out here... pricing has dropped like a rock in just the last year. at that price point, most of what you are seeing there is typically low quality bandwidth that's capped at a certain speed, and you'd probably be sharing a server with hundreds of other sites... but i'd certainly give it a shot at those rates!! if you are looking for a price point comparison, i have a couple of sites on my dedicated windows media streaming server, at $167 a month, for 1,200 gigs of bandwidth a month... it's all savvis bandwidth, which is top notch stuff, but at least $30 a month of that is just for the windows 2003 server license rental. $167 a month seems expensive by comparison, but i only got that rate after months of researching dedicated web server hosts at www.webhostingtalk.com... and i've only had the server for 3(?) months so far, so the rates are fresh... all the websites in my sig file are on another server. as the cheap bandwidth goes, tho, so shall the dedicated server bandwidth... i may have to re-negotiate my bandwidth limit before too long, lol.