WATCH TV AND LISTEN TO MUSIC RIGHT
FROM YOUR WEB BROWSER
WITH NEW PLUG-IN
Edited And Partially written By Ralph Thomas

 

 

 

REAL VIDEO PLUG-IN IS OUT!

 

 

In March, I got the below published press release from Real Audio about the beta release of Real Video. I rushed over and downloaded it, logged off the internet, installed the Real Video plug-in into my Netscape 3.0 plug-in folder and five minutes later, I was back on the web watching Fox News Live TV with the Real Video Plug-in. You'll note from the screen capture above that there are channel buttons you can hit. You can get video tech report videos, watch movie preview videos, check out the TV channel or hit the news button to watch Fox News Network TV live. I surf at 28.8 right now and the Real Video seems to load fast with both sound and video. Amazing!
Here is my review of this amazing new plug-in followed by the orginal press release I got from Real Audio via email.

 

FAST LOADING
Don't ask me how it works but it loads fast. I had no problem watching a full half hour of live Fox News Network TV with no problem. (Bye-bye--old- worn-out TV set!) From watching it, here is my guess on what is happening. Somehow, the actual live TV and video programs are turned into frame-cuts, some of the frames cut out and then massive compression takes place to get the live TV to load fast at 28.8 BPS. You can tell that there are frame-cuts because when someone is talking their lips don't always move when they are talking but sometimes they do. Despite this little drawback I feel this is some plug-in!

 

 

CONTROLS

You can hit the channel buttons to obtain just music or live video. You can also hit the scan button to scan radio channels. You can start and stop both video and sound. You can adjust the size of your video picture. You can also adjust the sound volume. The little black box in the bottom left hand corner giving you your streaming information. Every once in a while--things stop and you get a little message that says "net congestion" but it only happened a couple of times while I was watching TV News and came right back on in a few seconds.

 

PULL-DOWN WINDOWS

You'll find some useful pull-down menus some of which toggle you back to your web browser that give you ever-changing sites of channels and what you can watch on both the Video and Music only selections. You'll also find excellent help files in the pull-down windows and a very cool little connection data window that tells you how your internet connection is doing.

 

SETUP FOR TIMESAVING MULTITASKING
As I write this report on PageMill 2.0, I'm still on the web and watching and half listening to Fox News. I also have a web browser page in Netscape 2.0 opened and actually took the above screen capture, imported it into Photoshop 4.0, cropped the screen capture, turned it into a fast loading JPEG and then imported it onto the top of this page. All the while the live video and sound from Fox News ran. What that really means is you can now watch live TV news, read your email and perform other computer tasks at the same time. What a world we live in!

 

MUSIC!
I work a great deal at night--and early morning. My better half (Barbara) and my other two loved ones ( a dog named Skyler and a dog named Gadget) are usually sound asleep. I just plug my headphones into my computer and listen to classical music as I work. Real Video gives you great music options from various radio stations connected to the net.

 

Here is the Live Audio press release on it. I recommend you go get the plug-in and try it. It works with both Netscape and Explorer and there are versions for both PC/Window and Apple.

 

 

This just in from the makers of the Real Audio Web Browner Plug-in

 

We are pleased to introduce RealVideo, breakthrough-quality video for the Web.

 

To play the new RealVideo and all the great RealAudio content on the Web, upgrade to the new RealPlayer 4.0 or RealPlayer Plus 4.0.

 

Watch 3 original short films from filmmaker Spike Lee, music videos from

every major record label, live C-SPAN, and more RealVideo from over 60 sites.

 

Plus, if you purchase RealPlayer Plus by March 31, you'll get a free subscription to ESPNET SportsZone, including NBA Live Audio which brings you every NBA game, every night live in RealAudio.

 

Download now at:

 

http://www.real.com/rvnba.html

 

We hope you enjoy RealVideo!

 

Rob Glaser

Chairman & CEO

Progressive Networks

 

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