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Cell Relay Retreat>List Archive>month:1998-Sep> msg00315



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Re: ip multicast

  • From: Simon Leinen <simon@limmat.switch.ch>
  • Date: 25 Sep 1998 17:54:53 +0200

>> Our University campus roter is not IP multicast enabled. However I
>> can "listen" to the radio stations on Internet (which I suppose to
>> use IP multicast).

> You are probably using Real Audio, which is not IP multicast.
> It is (IMHO) a straight IP connection.

RealAudio does contain support for multicast, but since most RealAudio
servers don't have IP multicast connectivity to most clients, it is
rarely noticed - RealAudio "falls back" to traditional unicast
communication.

> I'm listening to Virgin Radio, www.virginradio.co.uk at the moment.

> One wonders when the strain will start to show, when more and more
> users use Real Audio and Real Video streams (dare I mention the
> Clinton tape?)  I for one (and I guess a lot of the people in this
> group do too!) that ATM can then do the job it was intended to, and
> ride to the rescue.

This particular application seems to be quite well supported by IP
multicast.  Implementing IP multicast on the complete Internet would
seem like a trivial task compared to building a public ATM service to
replace the Internet.  Not that I think that the former will happen
anytime soon, but the latter seems really unlikely.

As more and more people get fast connections to the Internet (using IP
over Cable or xDSL), multicasting video/audio will become more
interesting to ISPs, because it is a relatively cheap way to fill up
those lines.
-- 
Simon Leinen				       simon@babar.switch.ch
SWITCH				   http://www.switch.ch/misc/leinen/

	    Who is General Failure & why's he reading my disk?