StreamonixOS

The SX7000's MediaStreamer Nodes are powered by StreamonixOS™, a 64-bit, real-time, distributed, RAM-based Operating System specifically designed and developed “from scratch” for terabit media streaming from Multi-Node platforms.

StreamonixOS runs across all CPUs in the SX7000's MediaStreamer Nodes — and all MediaStreamer Nodes in an SX7000 Cluster — tightly coupling hundreds of processor cores, memory controllers and network ports into a highly integrated, extremely scalable system that can address terabytes of distributed memory.

StreamonixOS has been painstakingly engineered to transmit hundreds of thousands — even millions — of video and audio network packets per second. This real-time OS transmits each packet precisely on schedule — packets are never late, are never dropped. This precision is a result of a critical and innovative capability: StreamonixOS's performance ceiling is higher than the line speed of its associated network interfaces. This gives StreamonixOS the power to saturate the SX7000's six 10 Gigabit Ethernet ports with a torrent of precisely timed video and audio packets.

To obtain the highest possible streaming performance, StreamonixOS takes the radical step of incorporating highly optimized UDP/IP and TCP/IP Media Servers directly into the kernel:

UDP-based Media Server

The integrated UDP-based Media Server packetizes audio and video streams into UDP (or RTP-over-UDP) packets and transmits each one at precisely the time dictated by each stream's embedded clock. This “push”-based approach gives StremonixOS tremendous streaming flexibility — the capability to transmit any stream regardless of its bit-rate, whether a few kilobits per second or gigabits.

As an intrinsic component of StreamoixOS, the UDP Media Server leverages its distributed architecture to scale up to terabit-per-second aggregate streaming rates. The UDP Media Server delivers MPEG2 Transport Stream containers (carrying H.264, MPEG-2, AVS, VC-1, Motion JPEG 2000 and Dirac video payloads), and H.264 video carried directly in 3GP containers or over RTP, with full support for RTSP.

HTTP & RTMP Media Servers

In contrast to UDP-based “push” streaming, Web video is progressively downloaded by Web browsers — running on PCs, Tablets and SmartPhones — which “pull” video segments Over-the-Top from HTTP and RTMP servers as needed. Embedded in StreamonixOS are extreme performance HTTP & RTMP Media Servers that serve static Web content and Adobe Flash video to thousands — scalable to millions — of users.

These TCP-based Media Servers are built upon StreamonixOS's Distributed TCP/IP Protocol Stack. This revolutionary, patented TCP technology enables StreamonixOS to deliver HTTP and RTMP content at the highest aggregate bit-rate in the industry — with a commensurate reduction in system complexity and administration. To find out more about our Distributed TCP/IP Protocol Stack technology, please refer to our “Federated Operating System for a Server” patent:

Security

A last but vital point: to safeguard the media content being streamed from the SX7000, StreamonixOS incorporates a rigorously defined and implemented security architecture that eliminates the vulnerabilities caused by buffer-overflows and other software deficiencies.

The 80/20 Rule: Tall Heads & Long Tails

The architecture for our video streaming technology is based on Pareto's “Law of the Vital Few,” also known as the “80/20 Rule.” Applied to the media business — video streaming included — this Rule states: 20% of titles generate 80% of sales.

The SX7000's MediaStreamer Nodes instantly support thousands of requests for the top 20% of titles — the “Tall Head” — while its MediaStor Node's arrays of Solid State Drives provide terabytes of high performance storage the 80% of titles in the “Long Tail.”

Applying 80/20 Rule to Streaming Diagram

With Streamonix streaming systems, content distributors can fully satisfy the high demand for their hottest programs and movies, while offering users 1000s of titles to choose from.

Video Protocols, Containers, Payloads & Bit-rates

StreamonixOS, the high performance Operating System powering the SX7000's MediaStreamer Nodes, provides full support for IPv4 and IPv6 network protocols, delivering video-over-IP using both “Push” and “Pull” protocols.

For “Push”-based streaming over UDP and RTP/UDP (with RTSP), StreamonixOS transmits MPEG-2 Transport Stream and 3GP containers carrying H.264, MPEG-2, AVS, Motion JPEG 2000, Dirac and VC-1 payloads.

For “Pull”-based streaming (progressive downloading) of video over HTTP/TCP and RTMP/TCP, StreamonixOS includes extremely high-performance Parallel HTTP & RTMP Servers built upon our next-generation Distributed TCP/IP Protocol Stack.

StreamonixOS's support for a wide range of video formats and network protocols enables the SX7000 to:

• Stream any combination of Mobile, Standard Definition, High Definition and Digital Cinema content
• Transmit videos encoded at any bit rate — from 64 Kbps Mobile video to 800 Mbps 3D 4K Digital Cinema streams

Scalability & Clustering

Based on a Quad-Node, Multi-OS High Performance Computing platform, the SX7000 combines the extreme performance of RAM-based video streaming with the enormous capacity and reliability of SSD-based video storage.

Multiple SX7000s can be clustered via 40 Gbps InfiniBand to give a linear increase in performance.

A rack of 20 SX7000s transmits video at more than 1 Terabit per second — that's 528,000 simultaneous on-demand Standard Definition H.264 streams.

Continuing with this example, that rack of 20 SX7000s provides 5.6 Terabytes of RAM-based storage — enough space to hold an entire video library in memory.

One rack.
1 Terabit of real-time streaming bandwidth.
5.6 Terabytes of RAM-based cache.
230 Terabytes of SSD-based storage.
More video streaming performance than a large data-centre.
That's our definition of Scalable.

Sophisticated and robust dynamic caching algorithms in StreamonixOS determine which files — or parts of files — are cached on the SX7000's MediaStreamer Nodes and which ones remain on the MediaStor Node.

The diagram below illustrates a highly scalable, next-generation High Definition Video Streaming Network — featuring both live streaming and video-on-demand — based on Streamonix technology (click for larger version):

Streamonix Streaming Scenario Diagram