feature spark receiver software the wonderful web-tv world of

88 89TELE-satellite International — The World‘s Largest Digital TV Trade Magazine — 09-10/2012 — www.TELE-satellite.com www.TELE-satellite.com — 09-10/2012 — TELE-satellite International — 全球发行量最大的数字电视杂志

The Wonderful World of Spark

•Largeselectionoffreelyreceivablechannels•Web-TVoffersSD,HDand3Dchannels•SimplemanualeditingofthechannellistinSpark•SparksoftwareshowsallofthetechnicalparametersoftheWeb-TVchannel

Part 4: Web-TV

Spark Receiver Software FEATURE

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90 TELE-satellite International — The World‘s Largest Digital TV Trade Magazine — 09-10/2012 — www.TELE-satellite.com

Spark Receiver Software

Unlimited TV via the InternetThomas Haring

FEATURE

just software updates or the transfer of recordings.

Fulan takes it quite a few steps further and opens for the user not only the tun-er input as a signal source but also the Internet as a way to view hundreds of TV channels. This function can be found on any Spark software equipped receiver under the Web-TV menu in the Networking section of the Main menu. Before we go deeper into the special-ties of this feature, we want to quickly get a handle on some of the terms that you might come across.

The International Tele-communication Union (ITU) defines IPTV as TV, video, audio, picture, multimedia and data services that are transmitted via IP based networks with the required amount of quality, security, interactivity and reliability. Clearly, though, the Inter-net does not satisfy all of the requirements of qual-ity, security and reliability so that it’s relatively easy to tell the difference be-tween WebTV and IPTV. If an end-user uses his receiv-er, whether it’s a mobile or stationary device, to make a direct connection with the IPTV network of his pro-vider without the need of an Internet connection, then we’re talking about IPTV. If the Internet is required as a transmission medium, then it’s WebTV.

While the IPTV end-user, in a provider controlled en-

1. The WebTV player can be found in the Networking section of the Spark software2. While the channel list appears on the right side of the display, the currently selected channel can be seen in a smaller window on the left side3. Even HD content can be received via WebTV

Fulan, with their Spark software platform, has giv-en themselves an ambitious goal: and that is to provide the end user a software package for their digital re-ceiver with the largest pos-sible array of functions. Ob-viously, with requirements like these, the network/Internet connection of the receiver won’t be limited to

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4. Depending on the WebTV broadcaster, the picture quality is average to very good; there’s nothing to object to here5. The individual WebTV stations can be edited directly from the receiver6. New WebTV stations can be added with the push of just one button7. Regardless of whether it’s music, movies, sports or adult-oriented content, Web-TV has something for everyone8. Currently, there’s no standard channel list for WebTV available from Fulan, this will change in the future9. Technical details of an HD stream via WebTV. The resolution is 720p while the signal is transmitted in MPEG4/H.26410. An XML file with about two dozen WebTV channels

essary reception hardware to the end-user.

The absolute best part about WebTV is that so much content is available free of charge while IPTV is not free because of the costs incurred by the pro-viders for infrastructure maintenance.

Let’s get back to the digi-tal receiver with the Spark software: when you turn on the WebTV function for the first time, you’ll be greeted with a blank screen with-out any programming en-tries. Fulan is planning to offer a standard channel list with a number of inter-esting entries, but, unfor-tunately, this feature was not yet available on our test sample. While it is relatively easy with satellite or cable reception to set up a fre-

vironment, can expect and demand the proper content quality, WebTV providers are not at risk in this regard. Instead of setting up and using their own IP broad-casting networks, they opt to utilize the freely available Internet and pass on the problems of transmission speed, service availability and in most cases the nec-

quency/channel list based on the planned marketing area, this task would be more difficult with WebTV. The available content is far too extensive and the wish-es of the end-users are also far to individualized.

For our tests the first task was to start an Internet search. In just a few mouse clicks we found a multitude of complete lists with inter-esting channels. It includ-ed news reports, sporting events and music channels as well as sub-channels, HD and 3D movie broadcast-ers and even adult-oriented content. The URLs from all of these broadcasters are in an XML file; it’s a familiar file format from the Inter-

net that allows the repre-sentation of hierarchically structured data in a cross-platform text file. Such an XML file can be displayed and edited with most text editors without any prob-lems (Note: text editor pro-grams can only be used if the text itself is not format-ted). The pictures in this test report show an exam-ple of one of these XML files that contain several dozen interesting WebTV entries. To feed your Spark receiver with this XML file you sim-ply need to save the file to a USB storage device, con-nect it to your Spark re-ceiver and then press the ‘Load’ button on the remote control. You can also load the XML file directly from

the Internet using the FTP function in the Spark soft-ware.

Of course, you can also edit the channel list directly from the receiver; the green function button will help you get started here or you can add a new WebTV channel using the red function but-ton. The Spark software always blends in the chan-nel list on the right side of the OSD while the desired WebTV channel is shown in a smaller window on the left side. This gives the user a quick overview of what channel or program is of in-terest at the moment. Once you’ve found the desired channel, a simple push of the yellow function button

brings the selected WebTV channel to full-screen dis-play.

The picture quality from one channel to another var-ies greatly, ranging from perfect HDTV to pixilated SDTV. Once again the dif-ference between IPTV and WebTV can clearly be seen. With IPTV, the program-ming provider makes sure that every channel in the package reaches the end-user in the same quality. With WebTV, factors such as the bandwidth of the In-ternet connection, the num-ber of viewers and even the budget of the WebTV broad-caster can affect the end-user’s picture quality. All in all though, we were able to

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looking for an alternative to TV reception via the three classic methods of satel-lite, cable or antenna, you’d have to go the IPTV route. WebTV is a practical and, above all, mostly free way to watch TV channels via the Internet but there’s no guarantee that the same channel you were watching today will be there tomor-row, and if it is still there, its quality is not guaranteed. Another thing to watch out for is that the channels in some of the WebTV lists are possibly being redistributed illegally. In the course of our testing we discovered one WebTV list with dozens of Russian-language TV chan-nels - all being redistributed over one server – that we managed to localize to the Ukraine. Included in the list of channels, in addition to Russian legal/public and private broadcasters, were other familiar channels such as MTV. It’s fairly safe to assume that these streams were being redistributed without the owner’s per-mission. And sure enough, when we tried to access the server just before our dead-line, it could no longer be reached.

In the end though, it was for us a lot of fun to dive into the world of WebTV but it still remains just an ex-pansion of all the other re-ception methods. We also liked that the picture qual-ity of the individual chan-nels was on average quite appealing and thanks to the logical and easy use of the Spark software, WebTV is definitely interesting for professionals and beginners alike.

income that they would re-ceive from their own web site.

So, is WebTV an alterna-tive to TV reception via sat-ellite, cable or antenna? At the end of a test report like this, you’d undoubtedly be asking yourself that very question. Our simple an-swer to that is ‘No’. If you’re

11. 3D channels are also available via WebTV for free12. Music channels of all different styles are also available13. With X-Music, the name says it all

determine that the picture and audio quality of the indi-vidual channels ranged from very good to acceptable. To play back SD content, your Internet download connec-tion should be at least 1.0 Mb/sec while for HD content it should be at least 3.0 Mb/sec.

The Spark software’s WebTV function sup-ports the Flash format and MPEG4/H.264 in SD and HD. Keep in mind though, that you will need to know the URL of the WebTV stream. Content from the media sites of TV channels or clips from video platforms, even

when they happen to be in Flash format, can only be played back if you know the exact address of the de-sired stream. Unfortunately, many providers go to great lengths to hide these ad-dresses from the end-users mostly because they don’t want to jeopardize any ad

Spark Receiver Software SPARK OVERVIEW

Part 2:KartinaTV

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www.TELE-satellite.com/12/05/spark

Part 3:Spark Apps

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Part 4:Web-TV

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The Wonderful World of Spark

Part 1:YouTube

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www.TELE-satellite.com /12/05/spark








feature spark receiver software the wonderful web-tv world of

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