5 ms·

Software only. Determine your need for the number of processors and add that on. I'm looking at their $2000/mo plan for 100,000 minutes of video. Compare: Mo

Software only. Determine your need for the number of processors and add that on. I'm looking at their $2000/mo plan for 100,000 minutes of video. Compare: Modern hardware does HD faster than real time, there are 43,000 minutes in a month. So for a quad core machine, you already have a comfortable margin.

jon_dahl 15y ago
This assumes that you can evenly distribute your transcoding load over the course of a month. For most customers, transcoding needs are severely peaky - 10x or more from peak-to-average. So you either buy for the peaks and your hardware goes idle 90% of the time, or buy for the average and see long queue times. For most video publishers, each on-premise machine ends up using only a small fraction of 43,000 minutes each month.
- jfb 15y ago
  Also, that Rhozet/Main Concept/&c. are good enough, which in many cases is demonstrably not true.
  - jpdoctor 15y ago
    > Also, that Rhozet/Main Concept/&c. are good enough, which in many cases is demonstrably not true Wha? You think that Zencoder wrote their own codecs? They're selling an API and cloud tech, and with 20 people are certainly wrapping somebody else's encoding.
    - jfb 15y ago
      I'm not making a representation about our (1) tech so much as that of the other professional grade format conversion services. (1) I recently joined Zencoder. Consume appropriate amount of salt.
      - jpdoctor 15y ago
        Aha, salt consumed. I didn't connect it with the other comment above. I've deleted some of my other comments, we might as well make people do their own research on this. Regardless, good luck with the new gig.
        jfb 15y ago
        Thanks! I love HN for the civil exchange of views.
    - jfb 15y ago
      Also, do you have any idea what a broadcast grade format conversion box actually costs?
      - jpdoctor 15y ago
        Yes. My comments are not theoretical.
- jpdoctor 15y ago
  > This assumes that you can evenly distribute your transcoding load over the course of a month. No it does not. A low priced quad core is already in excess of their highest listed service, for less money. Put a dual hex xeon into service and you have at least 10x the capacity (remember that even HD transcodes at faster than real time), and it pays off in less than a year.
Xixi 15y ago
Cost of bare hardware is not what makes companies move to the cloud. Hardware / software licenses is an investment, cloud is opex (operational expense): it means you don't invest much upfront (Zencode, Amazon, etc. made that investment for you), but you pay over time. If your treasury is low you may not even have a choice between investing or using the cloud to begin with. So you are going to say: in the long run, opex is more expensive than a wise investment that pan out well. That's called risk management, and is the main reason many companies choose cloud services over in-house. You might invest in the wrong hardware, the wrong licenses in the case of encoding audio/video, or the wrong Linux/*BSD/Windows administrators. Switching away from Zencoder is comparatively easy and cheap. It's a trade off, you are basically paying a premium to reduce your risks.
- jpdoctor 15y ago
  > paying a premium to reduce your risks. It's an exchange of risks, not a reduction. You incur a sizable business risk by putting a nonprofitable company in your critical path.

jon_dahl 15y ago

This assumes that you can evenly distribute your transcoding load over the course of a month. For most customers, transcoding needs are severely peaky - 10x or more from peak-to-average. So you either buy for the peaks and your hardware goes idle 90% of the time, or buy for the average and see long queue times. For most video publishers, each on-premise machine ends up using only a small fraction of 43,000 minutes each month.

jfb 15y ago
Also, that Rhozet/Main Concept/&c. are good enough, which in many cases is demonstrably not true.
- jpdoctor 15y ago
  > Also, that Rhozet/Main Concept/&c. are good enough, which in many cases is demonstrably not true Wha? You think that Zencoder wrote their own codecs? They're selling an API and cloud tech, and with 20 people are certainly wrapping somebody else's encoding.
  - jfb 15y ago
    I'm not making a representation about our (1) tech so much as that of the other professional grade format conversion services. (1) I recently joined Zencoder. Consume appropriate amount of salt.
    - jpdoctor 15y ago
      Aha, salt consumed. I didn't connect it with the other comment above. I've deleted some of my other comments, we might as well make people do their own research on this. Regardless, good luck with the new gig.
      - jfb 15y ago
        Thanks! I love HN for the civil exchange of views.
  - jfb 15y ago
    Also, do you have any idea what a broadcast grade format conversion box actually costs?
    - jpdoctor 15y ago
      Yes. My comments are not theoretical.
jpdoctor 15y ago
> This assumes that you can evenly distribute your transcoding load over the course of a month. No it does not. A low priced quad core is already in excess of their highest listed service, for less money. Put a dual hex xeon into service and you have at least 10x the capacity (remember that even HD transcodes at faster than real time), and it pays off in less than a year.

Xixi 15y ago

Cost of bare hardware is not what makes companies move to the cloud. Hardware / software licenses is an investment, cloud is opex (operational expense): it means you don't invest much upfront (Zencode, Amazon, etc. made that investment for you), but you pay over time. If your treasury is low you may not even have a choice between investing or using the cloud to begin with. So you are going to say: in the long run, opex is more expensive than a wise investment that pan out well. That's called risk management, and is the main reason many companies choose cloud services over in-house. You might invest in the wrong hardware, the wrong licenses in the case of encoding audio/video, or the wrong Linux/*BSD/Windows administrators. Switching away from Zencoder is comparatively easy and cheap. It's a trade off, you are basically paying a premium to reduce your risks.

jpdoctor 15y ago
> paying a premium to reduce your risks. It's an exchange of risks, not a reduction. You incur a sizable business risk by putting a nonprofitable company in your critical path.