Now whenever I have tried to watch streamed video over the net, even with a fast broadband connection, I have been less than impressed. I usually saw one of four things happen; the video doesn't start to play at all, the video starts playing but then stops after a few seconds, video starts playing but keeps stopping and restarting due to buffering problems or the video plays start to finish but looks and/or sounds terrible.
Perhaps one time in fifty I might get lucky and actually watch something of good quality from start to finish.
Now I am sure I am not the only one who has experienced this. My PC and Windows software are up-to-date and my broadband connection is running fine. So what is the problem$%:
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When you consider how data is sent over the internet and all the potential areas for connection and data issues, and you consider all the processes that can be running on your PC at any one time, whether they should be or not, it's surprising this works at all really.
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But it seems technology is at last catching up with all the marketing hype (and boy there's a lot of that!). Sure there have been, for a while now, hardware products around that act as TV receivers that you can connect to your PC. But if you're like me, adding such additional hardware and drivers to your already slightly unstable Windows PC just seems like asking for trouble.
So, just out of plain curiosity, I just had to try some new software that's been around now for a few months. It isn't just streaming pre-recorded video to your PC. It actually claims to send live television pictures from thousands of satellite TV stations from around the world directly to your desktop, just using your broadband connection. Skeptical$%: You bet!
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But, try it I have. I paid my $50, downloaded the software, upgraded my Windows Media player as advised and started it up. There I was facing a list of countries and hundreds of their TV stations all waiting to be viewed for free.
The first channel I tried, just to be awkward, was just a random, incomprehensibly named channel from a country I'd never heard of. A few seconds later, there it was on my screen. Live TV, clear sound, great picture and none of that awful stopping and starting. It really does work! Twenty or so channels later I am totally convinced that this kind of technology is at last coming of age.
Not all channels are equal however. It really depends on the quality of the signal being transmitted in the first place. But with many of the channels I tried, even displayed full screen, picture quality and playback were excellent. The only slight niggle I had was that I couldn't immediately view every channel I wanted to, probably either because they were too busy or were offline at the time. But thinking about it, that's kind of inevitable really!
So take it from me, I've been converted, TV on your PC is at last a reality. So much so that I feel more than happy promoting this software via our website, and I am fussy about what I promote :-)
Best Wishes,
Dave