Hey, I work at Peer5 (another Peer5 employee wrote this article). We typically measure video user experience in several ways:
- The amount of rebuffering the user is getting (basically, the less the user sees the loading wheel the better).
- The bitrate the user has (are the users seeing the video in the highest possible quality?)
- Whether or not there are any media errors.
- The amount of time the video takes to load after a seek.
From the user experience - you don't really have control over these things - it's up for the broadcaster to set up a good service.
We've found (unsurprisingly) that services that are either paid or are national broadcasters offer better user experience than ones that are free and easily found online so my recommendation would be to spend a few dollars and get a solid provider.
(Also, the bandwidth you get now doesn't mean too much when the network is very congested - so it's worth checking how fast your network is during big peaks and considering a different ISP or a streaming provider that utilizes P2P)
- The amount of rebuffering the user is getting (basically, the less the user sees the loading wheel the better). - The bitrate the user has (are the users seeing the video in the highest possible quality?) - Whether or not there are any media errors. - The amount of time the video takes to load after a seek.
From the user experience - you don't really have control over these things - it's up for the broadcaster to set up a good service.
We've found (unsurprisingly) that services that are either paid or are national broadcasters offer better user experience than ones that are free and easily found online so my recommendation would be to spend a few dollars and get a solid provider.
(Also, the bandwidth you get now doesn't mean too much when the network is very congested - so it's worth checking how fast your network is during big peaks and considering a different ISP or a streaming provider that utilizes P2P)