Newcomer's guide to watching hockey

[noyb16]

A basic guide...
1. Download and install Sopcast
2. Download and install VLC Media Player
3. Read the first post of today's STREAMING thread in its entirety because there are a few other sets of instructions there for getting some of the streams to work properly.
4. At game time open Sopcast, look for the link next to the game you want to watch, and click it. Note that these channels are typically online only while the game is going. If it says channel offline and it's game time, wait a few more minutes and if it's still offline mention it in the STREAMING thread.
5. Report problems with the stream (ie. "Channel xxxx is not up and the game started 10 minutes ago, the video is lagging, there is no audio, etc.).
6. DO NOT COMPLAIN IF A GAME YOU WANT TO SEE IS NOT BEING SHOWN. DO NOT REQUEST GAMES IN THE STREAMING THREAD (that will make it less likely your game will be shown). Also, less important but still important, do not discuss the game in that thread. Use the discussion thread instead for that.
7. Enjoy what you get. The streamers are doing this out of the goodness of their heart. They get no money. They want no fame. They just want you to enjoy what is available. Many nights every game gets covered, so if your favorite team isn't covered tonight it probably will be next time they play if you don't beg for it. The streamers try to cover every game.

If you want this to work pretty well:
1. Turn off all downloads (including torrents and other filesharing) while you are watching the game.
2. Do not browse the web while you are watching the game -- just enjoy the game or disconnect if you aren't watching it.
3. Give the stream at least 3-5 minutes before assuming something isn't working properly. It takes a few minutes for these streams to stabilize by the nature of the technology.
4. Stay connected during commercial breaks and intermissions. Not only will you avoid the 3-5 minutes (or more) of instability mentioned in #3, but you will preserve the best stream for the rest of the viewers.
5. Only view HQ streams if you have a high quality internet connection. The cheapest DSL plan, for example, will not be able to handle it. You probably need at least the middle tier of DSL or a cable internet connection. You need a good download AND a good upload rate to be able to view HQ streams (good is probably a minimum of 500k up and 500k down).

Lastly, PLEASE read through the first post of the streaming thread slowly and methodically before asking questions. If you ask a question and it's already answered somewhere in the first post, you probably won't get an answer. The streamers aren't being lazy by bringing you the game. They expect you to not be lazy and make a reasonable effort to read what is there and give it a try. We don't type up instructions for our health, but so that you can get up and running as soon as possible without our help as we can't always help in a timely manner.

Oh, and if you follow this and the first post and still can't get it to work, ask for help by all means.

[pkcable]

Stickied! Good Job Noyb

[uroboros]

For Linux users there is a software called Sopcaster, that runs along with VLC.

"Sopcaster is a fltk gui for sopcast (sp-sc) which is a p2p tv streamer. Sharing is done
while downloading/uploading a tv stream at the same time. Pls thank www.sopcast.org
for sp-sc, also see the 'Readme' file for using sp-sc.

Sopcaster has the folowing features;

* built with Fltk, so does not need special gui libraries or other bloaty dependencies.

* single executable for linux i386

* paste sopcast link from external selection or paste buffer

* update channel list from sopcast website, select channel from list. "

http://petepr.drivehq.com/humpty/

[Cedur]

For those who don't want to use this gui, it's possible to "teach" Firefox how to handle "sop://" links just add the following into your config (about:config):

network.protocol-handler.warn-external.sop user set boolean false
network.protocol-handler.external.sop user set boolean true
network.protocol-handler.app.sop user set string /home/'name'/bin/firesop.sh

firesop.sh is a little script I wrote and which i've copied into /home/"username"/bin .

You can write it yourself or use mine:
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
#!/bin/bash
# Script to start sopcast streams as direct link from firefox.
# First you need the sp-sc command and this script in your /home/'name'/bin folder.
# Second You have to config firefox with about:config and add the following lines:
#network.protocol-handler.warn-external.sop user set boolean false
#network.protocol-handler.external.sop user set boolean true
#network.protocol-handler.app.sop user set string /home/'name'/bin/firesop.sh
# At least you need one of the following MediaPlayers installed: Mplayer, vlc or totem

sp-sc $1 3908 8908 > /dev/null &

SOPCASTPID=$!

declare -i i=0
dcopRef=`kdialog --progressbar "Initialising" 30`
for i in $(seq 30);
do
dcop $dcopRef setProgress $i
dcop $dcopRef setLabel "Sopcast is caching the channel ($1) for $i of 30 s"
sleep 1
done
dcop $dcopRef close

PLAYER=`kdialog --title "Choose Player" --menu "Please choose your favourite player (must be installed):" mplayer "MPlayer" gmplayer "gMplayer" vlc "VLC" totem "totem"`

$PLAYER http://localhost:8908/tv.asf &

PLAYERPID=$!

KILLER=`kdialog --menu "What do you want to kill?" $SOPCASTPID "SOPCAST PID $SOPCASTPID" $PLAYERPID "$PLAYER PID $PLAYERPID"`

kill $KILLER &

if [ $KILLER = $SOPCASTPID ];
then
kill $PLAYERPID &
fi
if [ $KILLER = $PLAYERPID ];
then

PLAYER=`kdialog --title "Choose Player" --menu "You have killed $PLAYER. Please choose another player or retry your first choice:" mplayer "MPlayer" gmplayer "gMplayer" vlc "VLC" totem "totem"`

$PLAYER http://localhost:8908/tv.asf &

PLAYERPID=$!

KILLER=`kdialog --menu "It's your second try so you will only be able to kill sopcast (the player is killed automatically) and restart the procedure" $SOPCASTPID "SOPCAST PID $SOPCASTPID"`

kill $SOPCASTPID &
kill $PLAYERPID

fi

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Just copy and paste the text into an editor and save it. Name it firesop.sh or whatever you want just tell Firefox the name and folder where you put it in.

Don't forget to make it executeable.

It's my first script so please be gentle but if you found something to improve please tell me I'm ready to learn ;-).

Have Fun.

Cedur

AVS Fan in Germany

[pkcable]

PROCEED with caution folks, but if you are using Linux you probably already know THAT and you know your way around a computer. ;)

[rheo]

What is the TVU thing? (i.e VP5 on TVU). When I click on it, a i get a message saying it can't do anything. Thanks for the help.


OH wait nvmd...I just DL'd TVU

Thanks for this site!! You guys are awesome

[Diehard Canuck]

Item 5 in the "If you want this to work pretty well" list gives some info on required upload/download speeds for HQ streams. What your ISP provider tells you is rarely what you will actually be able to achieve. You can test what you are actually getting for upload/download speeds here: http://www.speedtest.net/

[mmayer_01]

Hey i just started using this today and was wondering why i couldnt watch the leafs game before reading this, very helpful.
thanks

[honivag]

Hi. Great posts and great tips. helped a lot but i have two question I hope you can answer.
2 days I have tried to watch nhl online on Sopcast but every time Sopcast tries to connect to the channel it says " cannot retrieve data". Why is this happening?
I have tried to do this manually, copy and paste in the address in the server address field but what do I write in the channel id field?
I have windows vista and VLC player installed.

Regards // honivag

[pkcable]

Hi. Great posts and great tips. helped a lot but i have two question I hope you can answer.
2 days I have tried to watch nhl online on Sopcast but every time Sopcast tries to connect to the channel it says " cannot retrieve data". Why is this happening?
I have tried to do this manually, copy and paste in the address in the server address field but what do I write in the channel id field?
I have windows vista and VLC player installed.

Regards // honivag

It might just be sopcast right now, they are having issues with thier servers. I mayself can not connect to my own stream (from another computer) and am getting that same error. We have also had other problems with sopcast over the last 2 weeks or so. Hopefully it will be fixed soon. Keep trying!

[Flyers Forever]

can every body tell me how i can watch NHL on TVU Player i have problem with the channels i cant find versus or fsn or other channels how shows nhl

[oriax]

Lately, if there isnt any game i want to see for myself, ive started the feed and keept it going just because i thought this might help the overall stream. Kinda like u seed/leech a torrent.
Is this correct or not? I have 2mbit upload.

[Gandolf]

With that upload, definitely correct.

[NASN]

is sopcast running and buffer at to 70% and not higher
and VLC not open the picture !!!!

than open the VLC with network stream http://127.0.0.1:8902 and activate the cache (1200)
than comes the picture

[metalrose612]

Hi, folks!

I have a strange problem. I read that most of the folks that are watching this matches online have problems with low quality of the stream and to slow bitrate.

I have a vice versa problem. Even do I can see the matches pretty good, my bitrate is too fast.

Exp. :

At monday 15th I watched the game Hv 71 vs. Frolunda at STV2 with the average bitrate of 800 Kbits/s(upload + download), which is not so bad, but then I watched the match Skelleftea vs. Rogle via Sopcast and VLC at Thursday and the bitrate(U+D) was pretty high, average 2100 Kbits/s, and a match Sundsvall vs. AIK today at avg. of 1400 Kbits/s(U+D).

On the subforum at Live sport section bitrate should be (for both matches) 500 Kbits/s via Sopcast, so I'm pretty confused. How can my bitrate be so higher then the one that was written on the site?

I have an ADSL2+ connection and watching net with Opera.
Is this normal?

The problem is if I continue watching games all the month, my bills for spending internet memory will be too high, and unfortunatelly I won't be able to watch it so often. It spends too much memory.

On one ice hockey match like Elitserien I spend 1,6 GB(upload+download) of memory which is just too much(at that is without break time minutes).

I hope you can help me with this problem.

Kristijan from Zagreb, Croatia

[Gandolf]

Sounds vierd that the bitrate is reported with that numbers. It was me streaming the both games on sopcast and the average bitrate should be more like 400-450. If I were you I should change internet provider if it's possible. Paying for how much bandwith you use is ridiculous. If you can, change to one who has flat rate.

[metalrose612]

Yes, my ISP has a flate rate offer but i still didn't switch to it cause i tought i don't have to.

But the thing is you still didn't answer me how is it possible that i have such a high bitrate and others have lower. is the problem in my ISP or the stream itself? or something else?
cause if i change to flat rate i'll still have higher bitrate.

maybe the problem is with sopcast. the thing is that when i was watching football games with other programs or directly from the sites, bitrates were normal.

[modonian]

I have ADSL and can wath the 250k streams but when the streams are 400k the picture stops and it is impossible to watch because of too slow connection. Is there anything I can do with the current ADSL or do I have to try to fix a faster connection in my house?

[Ca$hman]

I have ADSL and can wath the 250k streams but when the streams are 400k the picture stops and it is impossible to watch because of too slow connection. Is there anything I can do with the current ADSL or do I have to try to fix a faster connection in my house?

Sorry, but you need a faster connection Stopping background apps using the internet might help a bit but it won't be enough.

[prisly]

Is there any page where i can watch nhl matches which were played few days ago?