What are Shockwaves weaknesses?
• Sometimes the streams aren’t as smooth as RealAduio. • Processor intensive. • To encode to Shockwave for PCs you need a program called Macromedia Director, which costs $1000. What is RealAudio? RealAudio is a compression scheme that shrinks files way way down and lets the audio stream over the net (you don’t have to download to hear it: the music starts about 5 seconds after you click). At present, it’s pretty much the standard for sending streaming audio over the net. You’ll need the RealAudio player to play RealAudio. What are RealAudio’s strengths? • Been around for awhile so everyone has the plug-in. • Interface is easy to use. • Streams very well. • Super easy to encode. You can encode directly from the source, so you don’t need to transfer the massive file onto your hard drive first. You just let your tape deck or whatever run, and the encoder can process it in the background. 1 hour = approximately 7 megs.
