NewTek TriCaster TC1 (2 RU) User Manual
Page 202
P a g e | 186
You should already be aware of the need for redundancy in a p
rofessional environment (you didn’t bring just
one camera, did you?) As reliable as any device may be, Murphy
’s Law has not been repealed … s
o you plan
for this, bringing the appropriate equipment, such as uninterruptable power supplies, backup recording
devices (there’s no shame in having a VCR backing up your digital record –
‘low tech’ still has a place in the
grand scheme.)
But you also need to perform onsite testing, to ensure your live stream is working well befor
e ‘zero hour.’
No-one will thank you for excuses, no matter how brilliantly they point the finger at forces beyond your
control.
1.
Set up and enable a test stream.
2.
You can use the integrated web browser to scrutinize the stream, but you should probably confirm
using an external system, too.
Success at this point does not necessarily mean you’re done. You may be able to see the stream locally, but
can someone outside the local environment connect to it over the Internet? The best way to find out is to
have someone at a remote location verify that your stream is streaming properly. If it is, great! Otherwise,
keep reading…
T
ESTING WITH
P
ING
Before your stream can be seen - whether on a local intranet or the Internet - client computers (or your
service provider) need to be able to establish a network connection with your
local system and it’s encoder
.
Ping
is a humble but effective tool to ensure the basic connection exists, thus it can help you with streaming,
iVGA™
and
LiveText™
connection issues, too (and it works just fine in a multi-platform environment!)
Ping sends a small set of
to the target host (IP number), then ‘listens’ for an echo response in
return. Ping estimates thicords , and displays a summary
when finished.
Bottom line, if you can’t ‘ping’ your target, your connection has problems (the prob
lem might be as simple as
a bad cable connection). To issue a ping, you need know the IP number of the target computer.
Finding the target IP number
For Windows XP
®
1.
Select
Run
from the Windows
®
Start Menu
(look in the
Settings
sub-menu if it is not listed at the top
level).
2.
Type “cmd” (without t
he quotation marks) into the dialog, and press
Enter
on the keyboard.
3.
In the command shell that opens, type “ipconfig” (without the quotation marks) and press Enter
again.
4.
The
IP Address
for the
system
will be reported in the window, along with other data.
For Windows Vista
®
(or later)
1.
Type “run” (without the quotation marks) into the
Search
field, then press
Enter
on the keyboard.