I've been reading the message boards around the web about QT 4 and I've found numerous people, quite frankly, outraged about the streaming quality of QT 4 while others think is the best thing since sliced bread. Well, after discussing this with my brother (a fellow mac user) and doing some tests, we came to the stark realization that it depends on what machine/connection you're using. Now before you say "no kidding" hear me out...

I've running an rev A iMac on a 28.8 modem while my brother has a 333Mhz G3 minitower on a t3, and guess who's performance is crappy while streaming? Not mine (the iMac if you're not following). The 333Mhz machine's streaming audio and video was complete trash. It sounded and looked terrible while the audio on the modem was great! The video was better on the modem as well (still better then Realvideo, that's for sure).

We couldn't come up with an answer for why their was a HUGE difference between the two machines other then QT 4 was beta. So when the next person decides to explode at Apple for making junk, just zip them a copy of this thread.

Cheers,
Will

Will,

We think your T3 quality was a result of network issues. Multicast relies on certain level of Quality of Services that the network (all the way to the backbone and to the source) provide.

QoS is a tricky business. Service Level Agreement (SLA) among ISP from which your T3 and Modem connection rely on could result in different QoS (even within the same network, things could be different depending on load or policy).

In short, Quicktime 4 (which based heavily on QoS. Real Time Protocol normally requires guaranteed bandwidth and latency. It could be quite sentitive to variations. <== this explains why sometimes your streaming does not look as good as before.) alone does not guarantee the best streaming quality (because the needed bandwidth and end-to-end latency depends on QoS. Quicktime 4 can ask for its QoS via signaling protocol like RSVP. It may be denied due to many factors including traffic load or network policy, etc.).

The good result with 28.8K modem maybe because of better QoS (The subnet the modem pool is in may not as loaded as the subnet the iMac/333 is on). T3 link does not means QoS is better all the time. Try setting the iMac/333's connection speed to a lower one may help.

[This message has been edited by MacNW (edited 04-28-99).]