How to stream live tv or video with VLC/videolan

Baldrick · Administrator Joined: 09 Aug 2000 Location: Sweden

This guide will describe the BASIC steps how to stream video/TV from your capture or tv card using VLC media player. You can stream the video to Windows Media Player or VLC Media Player. Read http://www.videolan.org/doc/streaming-howto/en/ch02.html for more information about streaming with VLC.

Tools required
VLC media player

How To
Install and start VLC media player
1. Select File -> Open Capture Device
2. Under Video hit Refresh list and select your Capture Card
3. Under Audio hit Refresh list and select your Audio Card
4. Select Stream Output
5. Optional, select Device Properties and Tuner properties to change default video resolution/size and Tuner properties . Default is 320x240 and your capture device last input, like SVHS or Tuner.
6. Click Settings, see below here

Stream Settings
Streaming to Windows Media Player
1. Select MMSH under Output Method
2. Note the port, you can change it if you like
3. Select ASF as Encapsulation method
4. Set the video codec to WMV2 and set the bitrate, for example 256kbits
5. Set the audio codec to MP3 and set the bitrate, for example 32 kbits
(increase the bitrate for better video quality but it requires faster internet connection)
6. Optional, select Play locally to view the video stream when you capture and stream

Hit OK and OK to start the video stream.

If you have selected Device properties or/and Tuner properties will some windows popup where you can change the default video resolution/size and/or tv tuner settings. 320x240 or 384x288 resolutions/sizes are good for most video streaming. (these properties are not same for all capture cards so I can't post any specific settings)

Play the streaming media with Windows Media player by open http://yourip:port or mms://yourip:port . Check your ip with www.myip.dk .

Tips
You can test different video bitrates and video resolutions/size. And test different video codecs, like the mp4v for better video quality but you can then only stream to a VLC media player, not Windows Media Player.

ticos2000 · Posted: Mar 06, 2005 16:36

great guide baldrick as always but i found a problem, no image no audio despite the fact that WMP (windows media player) seems to be downloading something and buffering the signal incoming....as soon as it finished start playing but i can not see any image and not sound at all...i followed your reccomendations....any idea?

best regards from bogota colombia south america

Tico

hrlslcbr · Member Joined: 31 Mar 2004 Location: NTSC

Do you have the codecs installed?

ticos2000 · Posted: Mar 08, 2005 07:15

thanks for your prompt answer...... but could you be more specific?...I have XP with wmp version 10 and as far as i know the video codecs are there at least for wmv2....is that you what you´re talking about?

thanks

Tico

Baldrick · Administrator Joined: 09 Aug 2000 Location: Sweden

have you tried stream with windows media encoder instead?
http://www.videohelp.com/guides.php?guideid=639&howtoselect=9;53#639

videolan may not work with all capture cards.

MadBison · Member Joined: 27 Jul 2002 Location: Australia

A little unrelated, but can anyone tell me how to capture a stream to a DIVX file using VLC Client?

I can view the stream fine. I can save the stream to MPEG1 and WMV fine. But I cannot get divx/mp3 working.

I ticket "Stream output", went into settings, and set many different options, but none of the DIVX options worked.

I thought that at least one of the following would work:
Encapsulation Method: WP4, or RAW
Video Codec: Div1, Div2, Div3, or MP4v
Audio output: MP3

None worked.

Any help greatly appreciated

kus · Member Joined: 27 Jul 2005 Location: Slovenija

Aloha...

I am wondering if any of you guys knows how would it be possible to capture and stream more than one TV channels.

I have a CATV with about 70 channels and I would like to stream as many of them as possible.

Tnx.

KuS

Baldrick · Administrator Joined: 09 Aug 2000 Location: Sweden

cabletv? you need one tv card for each channel then.

or is catv something else???

and one post is enough.

cptnjarhead · Member Joined: 07 Nov 2005 Location: United States

Is It possible to stream outside of a network over the internet. I have tried with no luck.
Thanks
CptnJarhead

GeBu · Member Joined: 07 Dec 2005 Location: Czech Republic

This tutorial does not work for me with version 0.8.4. WMP crashes.
I think it worked before.

atulbha · Member Joined: 06 Dec 2005 Location: Canada

I been having problems while using VideoLan to stream video locally with Windows Media Service. It appears that VideoLan generated output is incompatible with WMS. I have been told this may be due to the headers being different, although the video still plays in WMP. Any ideas how to get around the problem? Help will be appreciated.

GeBu · Member Joined: 07 Dec 2005 Location: Czech Republic

I'm sorry. It was problem with my WMP - he crashes with every internet stream. On other computer it works.

Crazyj32 · Member Joined: 20 Apr 2006 Location: United States

BTW to get my (locol) ip address (in the host computer) I had to run cmd then type in ipconfig/all then [enter]. then i typed this ip into wmp (in the client comp) to get the stream via my wireless router. It worked perfectly using windows media encoder to stream the video. Video quality was almost as good as original.

However using vlc to encode the video resulted in more buffering at lower bitrates. Maybe this was because vlc wasnt able to create stream with dimensions identical to source and therefore more work was required. (windows media encoder was able to match source dimensions)

ashish · Member Joined: 12 Dec 2006 Location: India

Can anyone tell if I can mix two audio stream before streaming?

For example, I chose directshow and my webcam for video and I want two audio inputs, one from some other audio stream and another from the mic. Can I mix these two audios and stream?

Even if tweaking of source code is required, I can do it.

Thanks in advance

lilpunk1302 · Member Joined: 24 Mar 2007 Location: Canada

Ok, well I kinda got mine working, I set it up exactly like you said( and tried a couple variations.) and whenever I try to open the stream on a different computer, it says that some codecs are not present and it might not play the file correctly, the video works fine, but I get no audio. I'm using a WinXP SP2 pc as the server, and Windows media 9 on mac for the player, I've tried using VLC on the mac for playing it, but it doesn't work at all, (refuses to connect, I click play and it just tells me the stream address for 3 seconds, then goes back to saying Video Lam Player. So yeah, I've also tried using Windows media encoder, but because of the fact that I'm remote logging in to my server to set it up (I'm like 4 hours away from it in the ideal client location) it's crashing every time, so yeah, suggestions? Ideas? Also, I'm not that new to the whole streaming scene, I used to run a Web-Radio with both shoutcast and Windows media encoder 9, so yeah, I'm just new to the video scene, so yeah...Ideas? Thanks in advance, also, I'm pretty experienced in PC's, so I don't really need step-by-step instructions, just a general outline of ideas.

DaComboMan · Member Joined: 03 May 2007 Location: Canada

Hi,

First post!

I tried to get the "refresh list" refreshed ha! and nothing happens.

dssman006 · Member Joined: 16 May 2007 Location: United States

I'm having trouble with sound from the TV Tuner card. I have tried VLC/Videolan, Windows Media Encoder, Star Media Center, Unreal Media Server, and NSV Winamp. Each one has the same problem. The video comes through just fine, but I don't get any audio. Shouldn't I have an option to select my tuner card under Audio instead of my sound card?

I have the WinTV PVR-150 MCE PCI Interface 1042. I suppose I could feed the sound direct into the sound card, but then wouldn't the video and audio be off? Anyone have any suggestions to get these programs to pull both video/audio from the tuner?

Thanks!

rleu007 · Member Joined: 16 Jul 2007 Location: New Zealand

thanks. the guide works like a charm. but i have one question

is it possible to password protect the video stream that i m broadcasting? e.g. the viewer needs to provide a login/password in order to view the stream

strandhill · Member Joined: 23 May 2008 Location: Ireland

Thanks for a great post, well written and easy to follow! After following many tutorials this one finally got my webcam to stream

The only addition I would make for VLC newbies would be this:

First thing you must to do is check the setting to 'Play Locally' before attempting to stream. At first I was getting nothing from my webcam/capture card

, then all i got was a blue screen

, finally I selected the correct input (for me) which was Video Composite, then I could view the webcam locally through VLC.

Next step was to follow your instructions for streaming through Windows Media Player which was successful.

Finally I changed the stream format to HTTP and could view the same stream through my web browser!

THank you, thank you, thank you!!!

At the moment I am still testing the stream and playing with the compression settings. I hope to broadcast the final stream to the world shortly on my website:

[url]www.strandhillsurfcam.com [/url]

Currently I have software which captures and uploads a still image of the local surf conditions on Strandhill beach, Ireland...but I cant wait to host the streaming video!!!!!

Thanks again,
Graham G

[url=http://forum.videohelp.com/images/guides/p1850314/www.strandhillsurfcam.com]www.strandhillsurfcam.com[/url]
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