Windows Media streaming
About Windows Media
Windows Media is a format for lossy audio and video transmission by Microsoft. The audio format is known as WMA (file extension .wma).
In streaming WMA is transferred over a protocol called MMS.
MMS disambiguation
The name MMS (Microsoft Media Server) is a bit confusing as it is often used to describe different protocols.
There are three protocols often called as MMS based on a similar protocol: MMS over HTTP, MMS over TCP and MMS over UDP.
The Streaming Client supports MMS over TCP and MMS over HTTP. For these protocols the following URL prefixes are commonly used: http://, mms:// and mmst://
For even more confusion the http:// prefix is widely used for w:Shoutcast servers.
The following table explains the URL prefixes used by the Streaming Client:
| Protocol | Prefix used by the Streaming Client | Commonly used prefix |
| Shoutcast | http:// | http:// |
| MMS over HTTP | mms:// | http:// |
| MMS over TCP | mmst:// | mms:// or mmst:// |
Streaming Client
Windows Media
This confusion with prefixes comes from Microsoft, those are basically two different protocols often called only MMS. The prefix mms:// stands for MMS over HTTP. Quite often it has also the prefix http:// - but do not confuse this with Shoutcast which uses also http:// The prefix mmst:// stands for MMS over TCP, sometimes also called only mms:// You have to enable each service on the Windows server - some radio stations provide only MMS over HTTP and some only MMS over TCP. Not everytime both services are automatically enabled.
Please try the firmware I sent to you in the previous email. The version number is still the same but it contains a fix which helps with certain MMST servers. It is playing here with all three mmst:// streams.
