Tsunami Streaming Middleware Supports Microsoft Windows Media, RealNetworks Helix, and Apple QuickTime
- STARBAK’s Tsunami Enabling Software Supports Industry Protocols and Runs Under a Broad Range of Operating Systems
Columbus, OH – July 31, 2002 -- STARBAK Communications -- the leader in award-winning, robust streaming media middleware, today announced a technology breakthrough in the streaming media industry. Tsunami enabling software is streaming middleware offering meta-streaming support for all popular industry players, including Windows Media Player, RealOne Player, and QuickTime Player. Tsunami simultaneously supports current open streaming standards, including MPEG-1, MPEG-2, MPEG-4, and MP3. Optimized for performance, portability, and reliability, STARBAK’s Tsunami enabling software can be easily tuned to diverse platforms.
STARBAK’s current generation Torrent technology has been licensed to industry leaders as embedded middleware to enable high performance streaming. Among the current technology licensees are Cisco Systems, Surgient Networks, Storigen Systems, and The Fantastic Corporation. STARBAK anticipates making the benefits of Tsunami available to its licensees and migrating Tsunami into its Torrent OSA and VCG appliance products.
"I stand in awe of the breakthrough created by our technical team. Tsunami streaming middleware is unique. It is the modality that enables clashing proprietary and standards based streaming to happily co-exist, yielding by far the highest and most reliable performance with the lowest cost available," said Garrett Dreier, STARBAK’s President and CEO. "We see the streaming market starting to take off. STARBAK will couple the technical innovation of Tsunami with extremely inventive value propositions for our customers and licensees. We will fully exploit our position as the streaming industry’s technical leader and as a small, nimble company moving at lightning speed."
"By licensing and receiving Microsoft certification STARBAK has proven that it is interoperable with our complete family of current generation Windows Media technologies including our streaming server, protocols and player," said Jonathan Usher, Director, Windows Digital Media Division, Microsoft Corp.
Tsunami support for RealNetworks Helix and Apple QuickTime was developed by STARBAK in a "clean room" environment without access to proprietary underlying programs. STARBAK also offers their customers fully licensed and certified support for the current generation of Windows Media from Microsoft. STARBAK currently has a license and distribution agreement in place with Microsoft authorizing STARBAK to sublicense tested and certified Windows Media Services 4.1 running under non-Microsoft operating systems.
Tsunami innovations leapfrog the existing functionality. Recently tested at greater than 14,000 concurrent streams, Tsunami has an extremely compact code footprint, scalability for future functionality, is modular - allowing for plug-in packetizers, and is the clear performance leader.
STARBAK expects to make Tsunami streaming middleware available for license as embeddable software and also foresees Tsunami as the future core of the Torrent Family of products, including the Torrent OSA (Origin Streaming Appliance) and the Torrent VCG (Videoconferencing Gateway).
The Torrent OSA distributes digital video over IP networks with up to 800 Mbps of throughput from a 1U server– the industry’s highest. The Torrent VCG streams, records, and archives H.323 videoconferences over any IP network, for viewing in Windows Media Player, RealPlayer, and Apple QuickTime. These next-generation streaming appliances provide enterprise, government, and service providers with a powerful, cost-effective solution for the enhanced deployment of IP communications over their existing infrastructure. Torrent products will offer a simple, drop-in box for implementing Tsunami streaming middleware.
The Torrent OSA supports live, on demand, unicast, and multicast delivery of multiple streaming media formats, including Windows Media Technology, Apple QuickTime, MPEG-1, MPEG-2, and MP3. Its user interface is simple and robust, with easy access to current streaming media features from the administration menu. Integrated hands-off administration provides for ease of individual account management, making the Torrent OSA an appealing solution to service providers and networking teams of large enterprise or government infrastructures.
STARBAK’s Torrent OSA and VCG share a consistent interface, providing a comprehensive solution that can be easily and seamlessly integrated into any existing IP communications network.
About STARBAK
STARBAK Communications, privately funded, is dedicated to reducing the cost and complexity of delivering streaming multimedia to customers, employees, and business partners. The company has created Streaming Middleware - implementing high performance Windows Media and RTSP streaming and cache proxy engines running under various UNIX operating systems including Linux. These solutions are easily integrated into existing network infrastructures while providing performance far superior to competitive products, including the ability to stream multiple formats from a single unit. Founded in Cleveland, Ohio in 2000, STARBAK’s first product, the Torrent Streaming Media Network Appliance, was launched in Q2 of 2001. Its Torrent CE Videoconferencing Gateway is the winner of Internet Telephony’s prestigious Product of the Year Award. For more information, please visit our website at: http://www.starbak.com.
All trade names, trademarks, and/or service marks appearing herein are owned by their respective holders.
Source: Starbak Communications