*************************************************************** RealAudio Player 2.0 Beta Release 1 (Windows) from Progressive Networks *************************************************************** Release Notes For the latest information see http://www.realaudio.com CONTENTS: Introduction Installation Procedures System Requirements New Features Firewalls Feedback Sound Quality The Internet Adapter (TIA) Known Problems Upgrading Your Browser Manual Configuration of the Player This document describes Progressive Networks' RealAudio Player. Our web site is http://www.realaudio.com. Please check it for the latest information. For technical information and answers to frequently asked questions, see http://www.realaudio.com/help.html. The software and documentation is provided to you in accordance with your license agreement. The RealAudio Player provides real time sound over the Internet. Once you have installed the RealAudio Player, RealAudio will play automatically when you select any RealAudio clip on a World Wide Web page. You do not need to load the RealAudio player first. The RealAudio Player only plays RealAudio files. It does not play .au or .wav files. To use your RealAudio Player, connect to a World Wide Web site that has RealAudio. Click on a link and the RealAudio player will open and start to play. The Player first contacts the host computer that contains the audio. It then briefly buffers some audio. If you are curious about the audio packets coming into your computer, please pull down the "View" menu and select "Statistics." ------------------------------------------------------------------- Installation There are two different RealAudio Players available for Windows: * RealAudio Player for Windows 3.1 and Windows 3.11 The installer for this player is called RA16_2B1.exe This is a 16 bit Windows application. * RealAudio Player for Windows 95 and Windows NT The installer for this player is called ra32_2b1.exe This is a 32 bit Windows application. It requires a 32 bit winsock. To install, execute the installer under Windows. If you want to control where and how RealAudio is installed, use Custom Setup. The default installation location is C:\RAPLAYER\RAPLAYER.EXE The RealAudio Player for Windows 95 and Windows NT consists of the following files: In C:\RAPLAYER (or the directory specified under Custom Setup): RAPLAYER.EXE, RATASK.EXE, RAPLAYER.HLP, README.TXT, START.RAM, COMPLETE.RA, THANKYOU.RA In Windows System directory: RA32.DLL, RA3228_8.DLL If you installed the RealAudio Plug-In, then in the plugins directory: NPRA32.DLL The RealAudio Player for Windows 3.1 and 3.11 consists of the following files: In C:\RAPLAYER (or the directory specified under Custom Setup): RAPLAYER.EXE, RATASK.EXE, RAPLAYER.HLP, README.TXT, START.RAM, COMPLETE.RA, THANKYOU.RA In Windows System directory: RA16.DLL, RACT28_8.DLL -------------------------------------------------------------------- System Requirements To play RealAudio files, your system must meet the following requirements: * 486/33 SX or better PC running Microsoft Windows 3.1x, Windows NT or Windows 95 * 8 megabytes RAM. * 2 megabytes free disk space. * A sound card with a Windows Sound driver. (The RealAudio Player is not compatible with the PC Speaker program or other software programs which simulate a sound card.) * An Internet Connection. Either a direct connection or a 14.4K Baud or better modem with a SLIP or PPP connection to an Internet Service Provider. * RealAudio for Windows 95 or Windows NT requires a 32 bit winsock. RealAudio now offers 28.8 content. To listen to RealAudio 28.8, you need: * 486/66 DX or better running Microsoft Windows 95, or Windows NT. If you are running Windows 3.1X, you will need a Pentium class machine. * An Internet Connection. Either a direct connection or a 28.8K Baud or better modem with a SLIP or PPP connection to an Internet Service Provider. RealAudio for Windows 95 and Windows NT provides a Netscape Plug-in. To use the Plug-in requires Netscape 2.b2 or later. ------------------------------------------------------------------- New Features * RealAudio 28.8 - RealAudio 28.8 is a new algorithm that provides enhanced sound quality to all people who have a 28.8 baud modem or better connection to the Internet. This near-FM (mono) sound quality greatly enhances the clarity of music and voice delivered in real time over the Internet. * Plug-in - The new RealAudio Plug-in for Netscape Navigator allows content creators to seemlessly integrate RealAudio directly into their Web page layouts. Plug-in's are supported by Netscape Navigator 2.0b2 or later. Plug-in's are only available with the RealAudio Player for Windows 95 and Windows NT. The Windows 3.1X RealAudio Player does not support Plug-ins. ------------------------------------------------------------------- Accessing RealAudio through Firewalls RealAudio uses port 7070 for TCP and ports 6970 through 7170 inclusive for UDP transmission. If you are accessing RealAudio through a firewall, your firewall administrator will need to authorize these ports. You can point your administrator to our firewall page, http://www.realaudio.com/firewall.html for details. -------------------------------------------------------------- Reporting Feedback We are very interested in your experiences with our beta products. Please use the problem reporting form located at http://www.realaudio.com/problem.html or the copy attached to the bottom of these release notes to report problems. If you have comments or suggestions, please e-mail them to beta@realaudio.com . ------------------------------------------------------------------- Sound Quality Audio is transmitted to the RealAudio player in the RealAudio format. The player then by default produces 16 bit 8 Kilohertz sound. If you hear garbled audio then you can change the kind of sound the RealAudio player produces. To change the kind of sound produced, please pull down the "View" menu and choose "Options". Select "Advanced" and you will see toggle boxes for "use 8 bit" and "use 11 Khz": * 16 bit 8 Kilohertz (default) * 8 bit 8 Kilohertz (select use 8 bit) * 16 bit 11 Kilohertz (select use 11 Khz) * 8 bit 11 Kilohertz (select use 8 bit and use 11 Khz) If you receive poor quality audio, please see our FAQ entry on audio quality by going to http://www.realaudio.com/help.html and choose FAQ. From there, select the "Audio Quality" entry. Please note that to receive RealAudio 28.8 you must have at least a 19.2KBaud connection to your Internet Service Provider. --------------------------------------------------------------------- The Internet Adapter (TIA) The RealAudio Player does not currently work with TIA. TIA does not transmit UDP packets to client connections. If you connect using TIA you will receive everything but the audio. A TIA version that supports UDP is expected in the near future. --------------------------------------------------------------------- Known Problems * Having large applications open may prevent the RealAudio installer from executing. If this happens, please close all other applications and then install. * Starting or quitting large applications while playing RealAudio can cause some brief disruption of the playback. * Playback on some 486/25 SX computers does not work properly. * The user interface during playback of 28.8 content on slower systems may have slow response time. Performance of other applications may suffer during playback. --------------------------------------------------------------------- Browser Upgrade After you upgrade your browser, you may lose the configuration information for the RealAudio player. The easiest way to re-configure your browser is to re-install the player. Alternatively, you can manually configure your browser: * Viewer name: c:\RAPLAYER\RAPLAYER.EXE * Mime Type: audio * Mime Subtype: x-pn-realaudio * File Extensions: .ra, .ram * Homepage URL: http://www.realaudio.com/ --------------------------------------------------------------------- Audible Defects There are occasional audible defects that are evident when playing audio clips. To help our continuous quality improvement plans, we would appreciate it if you could submit a problem report telling us which clip and where in the clip the defect is. --------------------------------------------------------------------- Manually Configuring the RealAudio Player In the event that RealAudio Setup was unable to find a Web Browser, please check our on-line help information for detailed instructions on how to configure your web browser. On-line information is available from http://www.realaudio.com/help.html Please be sure to send us a problem report if you have to manually configure the RealAudio Player for a supported Web Browser. --------------------------------------------------------------------- Copyright 1995 Progressive Networks, Inc.