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Author Topic: Content delivery via Broadband/Satellite vs Hard Drive Delivery Peter Clay Film Handler Posts: 16 From: Alderney, Channel Islands Registered: Aug 2013 posted 10-26-2016 12:11 PM                     Hi, Sorry if this question has been asked already but I was wondering what experience people have with content delivery over broadband or satellite vs physical delivery of a hard drive. The local Cinema I volunteer with has had Digital now for a couple of years and things have settled in nicely and we are now looking into what the costing would be like to have all our content delivered via broadband (or Satellite if that's better.) Currently our delivery costs are quite high due to being on a small island in the English Channel with not a huge population, (I think around 3 or 4 grand a year), however the local internet is not brilliant (currently up to 20MB but can be increased to up to 40MB) Would these speeds be sufficient for downloading the content or is this likely not a viable option. Is a broadband connection for downloading content viable or is it better to go over satellite (if that's even possible). Sorry for the vagueness of these questions as it's all a little new to us still and I just need to get as much info a I can to take back to the committee members so they can decide what they want to do. All the best Peter Clay  |  IP: Logged Leo Enticknap Film God Posts: 7474 From: Loma Linda, CA Registered: Jul 2000 posted 10-26-2016 12:26 PM                        For a typical feature DCP of 150GB, you'd be looking at 19 hours 53 minutes to download at 20 Mbit/s, and 9'56" at 40. Whether that is viable depends on a number of factors. I'd suggest that the most important ones are as follows. 1 - Is the broadband connection an "all you can eat" one, or will you be charged per megabyte? If the latter, it could get pretty expensive. In broader terms, you'll probably want to establish how much downloading your DCPs will cost you relative to having drives shipped at present. 2 - Is the 20 or 40 Mbit/s speed reliable and consistent, or is the reality that you will only actually get that once in a blue moon and when no-one else on the island is trying to use the Internet? 3 - How many DCPs will you need to download, and will they be available to download in good enough time? 4 - Will the software being used to manage the downloading enable you to resume an interrupted download mid-flow, or, if a download fails for some reason 149 gigabytes in, you have to start from scratch?  |  IP: Logged Peter Clay Film Handler Posts: 16 From: Alderney, Channel Islands Registered: Aug 2013 posted 10-26-2016 01:02 PM                     Hi Leo, Thank you for the info. based on the points below it may be viable. 1. At the moment we are on an unlimited plan of up to 20MB, and constantly receive between 15 and 18MB. 2. The speed connection does seem fairly consistent and the local ISP offers an upgrade to up to 40MB with a lower contention ratio of 10:1 for £65 per month. https://web.sure.com/guernsey/internet/home-broadband/superfast-pro-broadband 3. We generally show 1 movie twice a week, on a Thursday and Monday with the occasional Kids movie on a Saturday and Sunday. in the Winter months this is reduced to every fortnight with extra movies shown around the holidays. 4. The software/Hardware is what I'm not 100% sure on. We are looking at LANsat http://lansat.com/ . Does anybody have any experience with this hardware or is there any other recommendations out there. I guess what I'm really after finding out is what hardware is out there for Downloading DCP Content. All the best Peter Clay  |  IP: Logged Carsten Kurz Film God Posts: 4340 From: Cologne, NRW, Germany Registered: Aug 2009 posted 10-26-2016 06:04 PM                     The trouble is, you won't be getting a considerable amount of content with one delivery service. However, as you describe the geographic and transport situation, you should probably get your foot into electronic distribution anyway. I did test electronic delivery initially with a 16MBit connection, it took a while to get the content, but I didn't care, since there is usually ample time between booking/delivery and show time. Now we have a 200Mbit Gofilex line. As their gear is on 24/7 and operates in the background, you just don't care wether it takes 4 hours or 20 hours to receive your content. But do get the 40MBit line. In most parts of europe, these services and gear come for free, you pay for the broadband and electricity, they pay for everything else (Gofilex actually even pays for a dedicated high speed broadband connection). I suggest you try to get more than one service working at your location. Normally, I'd suggest you wait until the market has been consolidated and there are less players around, but in your case, you should try to get what you can, that also means satellite (which may offer some live alternative content opportunities as well). There are services/gear/protocol that make sure you get your content 100% correct. Don't trust anyone who suggests you should download features through your internet browser. That's okay for trailers, but not for features. There was an edition of cinema technology magazine dealing with electronic distribution a while ago. You should try to get a copy (PDF) from Jim Slater. It dealt mostly with the situation in UK and europe, so, it should be an interesting read for you. - Carsten  |  IP: Logged Pete Naples Phenomenal Film Handler Posts: 1565 From: Dunfermline, Scotland Registered: Feb 2001 posted 10-27-2016 08:27 AM                     Lansat is very popular here. I've installed many. It's a robust bit of kit and simple to use. I'm not sure of the current situation with regards to which distributors uses Lansat. You can safely say if the drive comes in a yellow box that is MPS, who are Lansat, so you won't get yellow boxes anymore.  |  IP: Logged Ian Garland Film Handler Posts: 23 From: oswestry, shropshire, UK Registered: Sep 2014 posted 10-27-2016 08:40 AM                     LANsat works well here on our 40Mbs connection, not sure anything has actually come in over it but we also have a Hughes satellite dish that brings in content to it as well. You may also like to take a look at 'Screenfast'. This is software driven via a standard computer. It is not automatic so you do have to interact with it. Mainly being used by Independent distributers but some majors are.  |  IP: Logged Stephen Furley Film God Posts: 3059 From: Coulsdon, Croydon, England Registered: May 2002 posted 10-27-2016 10:02 AM                     We don't have Lansat. There would be problems, not all technical, with instlling it. We do use SDC Screenfast. Our Internet connection is usually about 17 Mb/s, and a typical film download usually takes about 12 hours. Had some problems with the first few films, BBFC ratings tags not being supplied, and disks being supplied even when we had completed the download before the cutoff date. These problems now seem to have been resolved, and the system is generally working well. The time isn't usually a problem; we just leave the download running overnight. The biggest problem is the limited number of distributors who use the system. We typically get about 10% of our films this way at present, mainly from Soda and Altitude.  |  IP: Logged Peter Clay Film Handler Posts: 16 From: Alderney, Channel Islands Registered: Aug 2013 posted 10-30-2016 04:52 AM                     Hi Guys, This is all really useful info thank you. We do have a login for Screenfast but we are yet to have a film from them to try it out. I think they sent us the login when we booked AMY but because we weren't sure what we were doing we just waited for the drive to be delivered as normal. Next time we have a film that they deliver we will definitely try downloading. It sounds like LANsat maybe the way forward, especially if more distributers start using them. Again thank you for all the info. All the best Peter Clay  |  IP: Logged Dennis Fung Film Handler Posts: 11 From: Kwun Tong, Kowloon, Hong Kong Registered: Jul 2014 posted 11-04-2016 05:06 AM                    For my experiences, major labs from Europe will use Aspera transferring DCP. They may limited the download speed around 100-200 Mb/s, but it was extremely fast for me to download 400gb long titles with-in half day. http://asperasoft.com/performance-calculator/ However, it may require the recipient have enough knowledge to copy the DCP from local computers into server. About the Lansat, I don't have any experience on that. It is need to install this next the DPC server? Or I could install at my office and duplicate into CRU drive and send to cinema?  |  IP: Logged Pete Naples Phenomenal Film Handler Posts: 1565 From: Dunfermline, Scotland Registered: Feb 2001 posted 11-04-2016 06:42 AM                     Dennis, Aspera is used here too, but not for delivery to cinemas. It's used between facilities houses, studios etc and is sometimes used to deliver to festivals. Lansat could be installed beside your SMS or as you describe, elsewhere and content exported from it to CRU drives. I have a couple of customers who operate this way.  |  IP: Logged

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