Streaming Server Accelerator Setup

Figure 9 provides a visual map for the information in this section.

NOTE:  The letters in Figure 9 are referenced in the table that follows. The addresses shown are for illustration purposes only. You will need to substitute actual addresses for your network.

Figure 9

To Do This Notes

Understand Media Excelerator's features.
  1. To ensure you achieve the results you expect, we recommend you read the information in Using Streaming with Excelerator Features .

Ensure your basic network configuration is complete.
  1. See Basic Network Configuration Setup in the Volera Excelerator 2.3 Administration Guide.

Ensure that DNS resolves browser requests to the appliance IP addresses configured for the streaming server accelerator services.
  1. See Working with DNS in the Volera Excelerator 2.3 Administration Guide.

See A in Figure 9.

Increase the number of concurrent connections that can be serviced by the Windows Media server.
  1. If the Windows media server is running both IIS and MMS, ensure that the MMS service has HTTP enabled.
  2. Ensure that the services use different IP addresses.

If you know that users will never connect via HTTP, then it is not necessary to enable HTTP support on your Windows Media Server. You will not need to set up an HTTP accelerator service, as mentioned on the following page. This would be a rare circumstance.

If the server is running both IIS and MMS, you will need to create two Web accelerators on the appliance---one to accelerate the server IP address handling IIS traffic and another to accelerate the server IP address handling MMS traffic.

Set up an HTTP accelerator service

  1. In the browser-based tool, click Cache > Web Server Accelerator > Insert.
  2. Check Enable.
  3. Enter a name for the streaming server accelerator for your tracking purposes.
  4. Enter a DNS name, if desired.
  5. Enable logging and set up logging options, if desired.
  6. Ensure the Web Server and Accelerator Port field values are both 80.
  7. In the Accelerator IP Address list, check one or more addresses that the Web server accelerator will receive requests and vend data on. (DNS resolves requests to these addresses.)
  8. In the Web Server Addresses list, insert the server IP addresses (or DNS names) of the servers being accelerated.
  9. Click OK.
  10. Click Apply.

See B in Figure 9.

If logging is enabled, accelerator log files for the Web server accelerator will have the same name as the Web server accelerator.

IMPORTANT:  If you are using the default HTTP port numbers, you can only configure one HTTP service per IP address.

If you enter DNS names in the Web Server Addresses list, make sure they are not the names that now resolve to the appliance's numeric IP addresses. That would create an endless loop.

Set up an MMS accelerator service.
  1. In the browser-based tool, click Cache > Streaming.
  2. Click Insert.
  3. Enter the name of the service.
  4. Select Accelerator as the Type.
  5. Select MMS as the protocol.
  6. Click OK.
  7. In the Streaming Service Dialog box, type an alternate port, if applicable.
  8. In the Accelerator IP Address list, select one or more addresses that the Web server accelerator will receive requests and vend data on. (DNS resolves requests to these addresses.)
  9. Set log options if you are logging the services.
  10. In the Web Server Addresses list, insert the server IP addresses (or DNS names) of the servers being accelerated.

For more information, see Streaming Tab in the Volera Excelerator 2.3 Administration Guide.

See B in Figure 9.

If logging is enabled, MMS log files for the MMS accelerator server will have the same name as the MMS accelerator service. Both native MMS and HTTP-MMS requests will be logged in this log file.

IMPORTANT:  If you are using the default MMS port numbers, you can only configure one MMS service per IP address.

If you enter DNS names in the Web Server Addresses list, make sure they are not the names that now resolve to the appliance's numeric IP addresses. That would create an endless loop.

NOTE:  UDP requests are filled using TCP unless the Allow UDP for Filling option is checked when a Streaming service is created.