Event ID 342 — Broadcast Archiving

Applies To: Windows Server 2008 R2

When you use a broadcast publishing point to stream content, you can configure Archiving plug-ins in Windows Media Services to archive the content to a file as it streams. Archiving is useful when you are streaming content that is not already recorded—for example, a stream from an encoder. The archive file enables you to make the content available for on-demand requests or rebroadcast. You can either wait until the broadcast is over to make the archived content available or you can use the Play While Archiving feature in Windows Media Services to allow clients to stream the archived content, even as the server continues to archive streaming content to the file. For more information, see Archiving content.

Event Details

Resolve

Increase available system memory for archiving

Increase the amount of system memory available for the Windows Media Services process (wmserver.exe). For more information about tuning system memory for your Windows Media server, see Optimizing Windows Media Services.

Note: If the archived stream is interrupted by packet loss for a period greater than two seconds, the plug-in will stop archiving and begin archiving to a new file when the stream resumes. The presence of several small archive files in the archive directory is an indication that packet loss occurred while archiving.

Verify

To verify that the output from your live broadcast is being archived correctly to a file in the archive directory, set up a Play While Archiving configuration in Windows Media Services to allow a test client to read from the archive file as the Windows Media server writes to it. For more information, see About Play While Archiving. After you have configured Play While Archiving in Windows Media Services, you can view the archive file in Windows Media Player to confirm the quality of the archived broadcast.

To view the archive file in Windows Media Player:

1. If you want to view the file by using Windows Media Player on the computer that is running Windows Media Services, you must install Desktop Experience. For more information, see Installing Desktop Experience.
2. On the Windows Media server, open Windows Media Services. To open Windows Media Services, click Start, point to Administrative Tools, and then click Windows Media Services.
3. In the console tree, click the publishing point that sources from the archive file.
4. In the details pane, click the Announce tab, and then, in Connect to a unicast stream, note the value of the URL that a client can use to access the content.
5. Start Windows Media Player on a computer that can access the stream, and enter the URL that you noted in the previous step. You should be able to view the archived broadcast from the beginning of the event; however, you will not be able to fast forward or rewind the content until archiving stops.

Related Management Information

Broadcast Archiving

Streaming Media Services