Frequently Asked Questions

Below are some detailed responses to common questions regarding our services.

FTP access is standard for all on-demand streaming or web sites. You don't need ftp access for live streaming because there are no files to store.

We work with all of our broadcasters on an individual basis. Each customer gets a live account manager who personally knows their account. We work together with our clients at all levels of the service, from the initial consultation, to technical setup, to continued support on a daily basis. Clients are encouraged to call or email as often as they require.

We run security management on our main routers, and our expert technicians keep our systems up to date. We maintain critical patches, and are familiar with DoS attacks and exploits on the Internet, along with specifics when it comes to streaming media. We don't require any firewall or policies from our clients, but if ACL's (Access Control Lists) are requested we are able to meet our clients' needs.

We provide statistics for streaming services through a variety of methods, including email alerts, administration pages and radio broadcast metrics. Please contact us regarding the specific format and service you are interested in for further detail.

We can provide complete backup solutions at regular intervals, as well as Raid solutions for live backup redundancy on all storage. We offer multiple levels of RAID, depending on your specific requirements.

"Maximum Peak Users" is the number of users that can simultaneously access your broadcast at one time and is preset when you select one of our services.

Like seats in a movie theatre, when a user enters they will occupy a seat on your broadcast. When they leave the seat will be available for the next user. When all the seats fill up, the server will report that it is currently full.

You will know how much you are spending on the service ahead of time and as a StreamGuys customer you can add additional user capacity at any time.

We have data centers in 5 locations, Chicago, San Jose, Virginia, Tokyo and Amsterdam. All five data centers are located at Equinix facilities, premier data centers in The United States and abroad. Equinix provides state of the art facilities for fiber optic carriers and Internet service providers. You can take an online tour at http://www.equinix.com/data-center-locations/equinix-video-tours/ or we would be glad to tour our flagship facility in Chicago with you as well. The facilities are protected by hand and retinal scanners, Kevlar sheathed walls, redundant environmental conditioning, dry-pipe fire extinguishers, backup UPS systems, and multiple diesel generators.

Our network capacity currently supports upwards of 200,000 connections simultaneously. We have 9gbps available to us at any given moment and we add capacity regularly. Higher capacity can be provisioned within hours. We currently serve over 50,000 simultaneous connections to over 600 broadcasters from around the globe. Our fiber optic connections are directly connected to tier-1 level providers. We are constantly evaluating the bandwidth market and improving our network conditions.

Power failure is not an issue, we maintain full N+1 redundant power systems, including 4 battery backup systems with 6 diesel generators.

Data Centers(United States) - Chicago, IL;San Jose, CA;Ashburn, VA
Data Centers(International) - Tokyo, Japan; Amsterdam, Netherlands
Main Offices - Bayside, CA

We run multiple POP's. Should one go down, 2 others will continue to be available. By diversifying critical services we maintain 100% uptime. Beyond that, we deal with emergency situations proactively. All of our personnel are trained in earthquake preparedness, as our main offices are in California.

Our expertise is specifically in high volume streaming media production and distribution. We regularly deal with over 1200 broadcasters from around the world. We provide services for private, public, profit, and not-for-profit companies. Here is a list of some of the companies who use StreamGuys as their primary Content Delivery Network:

We are privately funded, and have been profitable since our company's inception in October of 2000. New interests, constant product development, and an ever growing number of broadband users have continued to fuel our growth.

We were working through the day of 9/11. We set up broadcasters during that time to provide independent coverage, as well as provided free emergency capacity for The Associated Press news broadcasting. We provided services first and asked questions later.

Yes, for all accounts with a signed sales order. We provide a master service agreement that guarantees your service level.

StreamGuys Acceptable Use Policy can be found here.

We can work up detailed quotes for yearly costs based on past usage patterns and estimated demand.
We also offer dedicated servers for enterprise level streaming, as well as enterprise servers.