On Tue, 07 Feb 2012 09:16:33 +0000, Invisible wrote:

>>> Damn. How do you ever get anything done?! o_O
>>
>> I use Google Reader so I don't have to visit all those sites to see
>> what's new.  Takes me about an hour in the evening to go through the
>> day's posts and see what's new.
> 
> It used to take me about 4 hours in the evening (i.e., my entire
> evening) just to read this newsgroup. (Although it seems a lot quieter
> lately...)

I probably spend a couple hours a day reading my 200+ newsgroups.  Again 
usually just skimming subjects for things that are interesting.

>>>> Yes, it is the connection that determines the picture quality.
>>>
>>> Erm, no. It's the quality that the file is transcoded at.
>>
>> A connection that isn't fast enough isn't going to show you the full
>> definition.  I defy you to demonstrate a high quality video over a slow
>> connection.
> 
> If the bitrate of the source is higher than the available bandwidth, it
> just won't play in realtime. It'll constantly stall to rebuffer. So
> presumably the guys behind iPlayer (and every other Internet video
> system) have to transcode to a low enough bitrate that it will actually
> play in realtime. The result is obviously poor image quality.

Clearly not, as shown in my photo.  In the case of Netflix, they use a 
dynamically adjusting algorithm so it can display lower quality if the 
bandwidth is throttled.  You'll note that I noted to Stephen that Netflix 
shows "Medium/HD" as the quality for that image - that's usually what I 
get.  If I had a slower connection, I get "High/SD" or "Low/HD".  If I 
had a faster connection, I'd get "High/HD".

> Consider, for example, that it took me 3 days to download Star Wreck,
> which is only about an hour long. OK, that was only using a 2 Mbit
> connection, but I don't suppose you can download almost 4GB of data over
> an 8 Mbit connection in one hour flat either.

That was at a fixed quality setting, not being streamed.

>> <sigh>
>>
>> https://lh6.googleusercontent.com/-UJGO-U7Whto/TzAdp1huWOI/
>> AAAAAAAABbs/1IPtFRGNv6Q/s912/2012-02-06.jpg
>>
>> Now consider that's a quick photo of a 10' screen streaming realtime at
>> 3 Mbps.  The bluriness you see there is an artifact of the camera used,
>> not the actual image on the screen.
>>
>> Obviously the necessary bandwidth exists.
> 
> Yes, the picture looks fine. I still don't understand how that can be
> possible though. The Internet isn't fast enough. I don't see how you can
> get the data from A to B fast enough for realtime playback.

Compression.  We've been over this before.

Jim

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