[SteveDH]

Not an entirely serious question as I can already see some problems in it.. just curious.
Could virgin theoretically deliver normal stations the same was as VOD.
i.e. All the stations are actually delivered on only 1 channel (or 2 or 3 to allow simultaneous recording or multi room etc). Once a station is selected it is changed at virgins end and then just fed down the single channel.
You could then have an infinite number of stations and all bandwidth problems would virtually disappear. It would also be easier to make sure people only got the channels they had subscribed to.

Ok terrible response times and not even thinking about changes in equipment etc. but just wondering if it would be theoretically possible

[dontpannic]

Originally Posted by SteveDH

Not an entirely serious question as I can already see some problems in it.. just curious.
Could virgin theoretically deliver normal stations the same was as VOD.
i.e. All the stations are actually delivered on only 1 channel (or 2 or 3 to allow simultaneous recording or multi room etc). Once a station is selected it is changed at virgins end and then just fed down the single channel.
You could then have an infinite number of stations and all bandwidth problems would virtually disappear. It would also be easier to make sure people only got the channels they had subscribed to.

Ok terrible response times and not even thinking about changes in equipment etc. but just wondering if it would be theoretically possible

Theoretically its possible, i.e using essentially a live stream over the VOD platform - but the channels still have to come from somewhere, that will generally be the same feeds you and I recieve at the moment.

I don't think it would help with bandwidth issues though - looking past that, Virgin'd still have the 300+ streams, plus a single stream for each one of its customers - which would add up to thousands of streams. Then you'd have to counter in essentially Slingboxes for each customer. It'd be rather costly!

Nick

[essjay21271]

Ye this is entirely possible and with the advent of IPTV could be a viable option in the future.

Using a IP multicast network the setops could be set up in a similar way to the VOD infrastructure.

although channel surfing would be slower as the setop would have to request the stream every time you turned over.

@ dontpanic not sure why you would need a slingbox for each customer though

[dontpannic]

Originally Posted by essjay21271

@ dontpanic not sure why you would need a slingbox for each customer though

I was using that as a metaphor - you'd essentially need a bit of hardware for each customer to stream what channel they would want to watch, and the slingbox is the closest thing I could think to describe it.

[davebav50]

Yes, but in reality you would have Media servers with cached content as close as possible to the subs wouldnt you?
Isnt this what they plan to do over the next few years when they switch to IP tv?

[TheBigM]

There is something kind of similar to this in the US. Here, we have V+ boxes in our homes. Over there, they are experimenting with remote "virtual" V+ boxes where all recording is done centrally - you are just sending the commands back via a very basic set top box. Whenever you want to watch one of your recordings it is streamed to you VOD-style.

A number of advantages to this in terms of physical equipment and anti-piracy but disadvantages in terms of bandwidth and network constraints.

[Daveoc64]

This isn't actually a pipe dream, it's in use on most cable networks in the US:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Switched_video

There are a few issues with it, but it could be implemented on existing set top boxes.