Magnet WebTV Video Review

We’ve been spending some time with Magnet’s great free WebTV service lately and thought we’d put together a quick video review for those of you who haven’t yet signed up for a free account. The service can be viewed on pretty much all devices out there – PC, MAC, Android, iPhone, iPad! Basically if it supports Flash OR HTML5, you’re good to go! Check out the video review below. We also got a chance to ask Mark Kellett, the CEO of Magnet Networks some questions on the service. They are just after the video, they are well worth a read if you enjoy the service and want to find out a bit more about it!

note from the video: Magnet Subscribers can pay an extra 3.99euro to add the extra channels onto the free package.

1) Can you talk a little about the tech behind the Magnet Web TV service?

Magnet has invested considerably in building up Ireland’s first IPTV video headend.
Is has taken almost 5 years to build, upgrade and maintain. We saw an opportunity
to leverage the fact that we had an IPTV headend and as such, could easily bolt on
an online streaming service that would enable us to take live video in the highest
quality, re-encode and mass distribute to all who wanted it.

We’ve taken the very same live video services we deliver to our customers in Fibre
To-The-Home developments, re-encoded them to MPEG4 video and then wrapped
the IP stream in either Flash (RTMPE) or HTML5 for Apple HLS. We’re using a very
well known content distribution engine to deliver the live streams to browser / mobile
clients.

The service is unique in that, as an ISP also, our transit links with other ISPs mean
we can service consumers who are not on our network, while limiting the traffic
impact on our network.

2) Will you be offering an option to select a different quality stream?

Our intention is to offer the best quality available to users depending on their
broadband downstream speed and equally if they are a Magnet customer. We
plan to introduce adaptive streaming in the near future which does not require the
consumer to tell us what quality profile the user wants, the service will be delivered
in the highest available. Of course, Magnet customers will find themselves being
delivered the highest quality not only because they’re a customer, but because they
have the fastest broadband available to them.

We decided to pitch the service at a medium quality because we felt the consumers
accessing the service from other broadband providers would have a poor experience
if we pushed the highest quality video we have available. The reality of the situation
is that we had to throttle back the bit-rate to ensure everybody got a fair opportunity
to use the service. Where issues do crop up regarding failure to deliver the WebTV
service to consumers due to inadequate broadband speeds, it’s up to the other
operators to clearly explain to their customers why they are unable to deliver a basic
level of service.

3) I see you now support HTML5 video for the Apple Devices, will HTML5 feed
be used anywhere else, or will you give users the option to select it as a feed?
(e.g. on Android Devices)

Our intention is to use the best delivery mechanisms available to each devices.
We noted with great interest the significant effort put in by Adobe to ensure the
flash player on Android is up to date and reliable, which is why we have selected to
continue using Flash as the delivery mechanism for Android. If HTML5 proves to be
better in the future, we’ll switch to that. The same goes for PC / MAC. The key driver
in these decisions will be quality of experience for the customer.

4) Are there any plans to open up the whole package to non-Magnet
subscribers? (i.e. Pay “x” for the whole package per-month)

No plans as yet. Our content contracts have strict stipulations as to where we can
distribute video to.

5) What’s the future of Magnet Web TV? Are we going to see it embedded on
Consoles perhaps? (like the RTE Player on PS3 or Sky on the Xbox360)?

We’ve just added the new Free-To-Air channels released on the Saorview platform
along with some international news channels. Consumers can now watch 11 great
live TV channels on the free pack.

The difficulty with pushing the service across all the gaming and smart TV platforms
is a clear lack of conformity from each of the manufacturers. They all want a piece
of the app market pie and as such, have driven the cost of deploying services such
as WebTV sky high as each platform requires an individual development cycle. This
invariably means the customer looses out. We were really excited when we heard
about Google TV and thought it was a platform we could work with if only some other
manufacturers signed up. Unfortunately that has not happened which forced us to
have a re-think and review what platform is a priority and what platform is not.

6) What’s the delay off real time for the a) Flash Feed and b) HTML5 feed?

Delay is not part of our vocabulary here. True, there is some latency in encoding
video for streaming to Magnet WebTV. We’ve clocked it at approximately 8 seconds
for both.

7) Are there any plans for an App to make it even easier to access the service?

We don’t have any plan do this just yet. The approval process for App stores can be
quite long and complicated. We believe customising the front end to render correctly
on mobile devices gives us a quicker time to market.

8 ) What are the minimum requirements, in terms of PC/Mac Spec and
Bandwidth, both Mobile and Fixed Line, and what’s your recommended system
for the best possible experience using the service?

We didn’t feel the need to advertise minimum requirements as we expect that
consumers using the service have had some experience of using You Tube or
maybe even the player from RTE. If their PC works with these, then it will work for
Magnet WebTV. It’s the same reason we decided to deliver the medium quality
bitrates from the off, we’re trying to reach as many consumers as possible without
any strings attached.

Regarding bandwidth, we believe a dedicated downstream connection of 1mbps is
sufficient as we expect consumers may be doing some background browsing while
watching live TV on WebTV.