Patent · US Expired

Method of providing replay on demand for streaming digital multimedia

US6496980B1 · kind B1 · utility

215Cited by
4References
42Claims
0Family size

Assignee

Inventors

Key dates

Filing dateDec 7, 1998
Grant dateDec 17, 2002
Priority date
Expiry dateDec 7, 2018

Classification

  • Technology area (CPC H)Electricity
  • CPC primaryH04N21/8456
  • WIPO fieldAudio-visual technology
  • WIPO sectorElectrical engineering

Abstract

High quality replay of a streaming multimedia video segment on demand is provided. The multimedia segment may be transmitted as a stream by a server system and received by a client system over a fixed bandwidth communications path. The client system receives a base layer of the stream, decodes the base layer and displays the decoded base layer at a first quality level. The client system stores at least a portion of the base layer in a cache. When a request for replay service for the multimedia segment is received from a user, for high quality replay, the client system may receive at least one enhancement layer of the stream corresponding to the stored portion of the base layer. The client system may then read the stored portion of the base layer from the cache, decode the stored portion of the base layer and the at least one enhancement layer, and display the decoded base and enhancement layers at a second quality level, higher than the first quality level.

Source: USPTO / EPO open patent data. Objective bibliographic and citation counts.