For Vindral, live streaming is all about creating spaces for interaction. As Per Mafrost, CTO of Vindral shares, “our mission is to empower our clients to create seamless, ultra-low latency connections with their audiences, no matter where they are”.
The Sweden-based live streaming service offers two specialized platforms, Vindral Live and Vindral Composer, designed to enhance live interaction in streaming.
Vindral Live provides ultra-low latency streaming offering synchronized, high-quality viewing experiences (regardless of the audience size or location). Vindral Composer is a real-time video compositing software for event-driven video compositing, color correction, chroma-key, visual effects and low latency live streaming.
“We’re able to support any industry that benefits from real-time interaction. Vindral Live is used in areas like live casinos, sports betting, online auctions and public safety (to name a few). Typical use cases include interactive events like sports broadcasting and live betting, where timing really matters as well as applications that rely on synchronized viewer experiences,” said Per.
“Our customers choose us because we deliver ultra-low latency streaming without compromising on quality, and we ensure that all viewers receive the stream simultaneously. But it’s our flexibility that sets us apart: we tailor our solutions to each client’s unique needs, adapting our platforms to meet their specific goals. It ensures that our solutions align with their distinct streaming objectives”.
“servers.com’s dedicated servers for streaming have been great to keep our streams smooth and in sync, and their flexibility and support enabled us to adapt our architecture to our needs.”
Premium quality live streaming is incredibly resource intensive. It comes with heavy traffic demands and achieving the high availability needed to deliver great end user experiences requires a robust streaming infrastructure.
“It was important for us to find a reliable server provider that could handle the high availability, and heavy traffic demands of live streaming, especially with viewers spread across the globe,” said Per. “In addition to heavy traffic servers, we require CPUs for demanding workloads and often GPUs/ASICs as well”.
Due to the resource-intensive nature of live streaming technologies, resource contention (when different users on co-hosted hardware end up competing for limited resources) can become an issue. To keep data flowing quickly and cut down on delays, Per and his team wanted to avoid shared environments.
“Shared setups such as virtual machines, where resource contention occurs, can be challenging for live streaming. Our setup is built to handle heavy traffic without missing a beat, so everyone watching gets the same experience at the same time.
“The reliability of our infrastructure really makes a difference to keeping things smooth, and we’re always working to fine-tune our systems to meet our customers’ needs for low latency and top performance”.
“[servers.com] listen to what we need, and you can tell they’re comfortable handling unique requirements. They’re experienced with custom solutions, which has made the whole process easy for us.”
With servers.com, Vindral found the performance, reliability and global data center footprint they needed to host their real-time streaming platforms.
“servers.com’s dedicated servers for streaming have been great to keep our streams smooth and in sync, and their flexibility and support enabled us to adapt our architecture to our needs”.
Beyond the physical hardware deployment, Vindral also found a meeting of minds in the servers.com team through a shared commitment to bespoke solutions and support.
“The onboarding process was easy, and servers.com’s support has been there for us from initial setup to specific customizations. It’s been plain sailing working with their team. They listen to what we need, and you can tell they’re comfortable handling unique requirements. They’re experienced with custom solutions, which has made the whole process easy for us.
“The team is quick to respond on Slack whenever we have questions, which helps us keep everything running smoothly and adjust our infrastructure as needed. Plus, their customer portal makes managing and ordering servers easy and intuitive, giving us full control.
“Having a responsive and supportive team has made a real difference to our experience. Knowing that we can count on them for reliable assistance gives us added confidence as we continue to work together”.
“The onboarding process was easy, and servers.com’s support has been there for us from initial setup to specific customizations.”
With live streaming trends changing so rapidly, Vindral are always looking to incorporate the latest technologies, codecs and streaming protocols into their product offerings.
“One big shift is the rise of new video codecs like AV1, which makes it possible to deliver higher-quality streams without increasing bandwidth,” said Per. “This is a huge benefit for audiences on mobile networks or in areas with limited internet speeds.
“Another significant development is the adoption of Media over QUIC. This approach aligns closely with Vindral’s longstanding practices (but does it in a standardized manner)”.
Media over QUIC (MoQ) is a protocol that enhances the delivery of media files over the internet by leveraging the capabilities of QUIC (a new encrypted transport layer network protocol designed to make HTTP traffic more efficient and secure).
“These technologies are helping us keep up with growing expectations for high-quality live streaming and prepare for even more demanding applications in the future”.
For Vindral, working with trusted partners is a big part of being able to react to these changes in technology so quickly. And infrastructure is no exception.
“servers.com have been a reliable provider and a pleasure to work with, and we’re looking forward to seeing how their services can support our goals in the future,” said Per.
It’s a partnership that goes both ways. As servers.com Streaming Specialist, Lukas Navickas, attests: “Working with Per has been an absolute pleasure defined by trust and collaboration”.
We’re excited to continue supporting the Vindral team in achieving all their future projects and goals.
Thanks to Per Mafrost for sharing the Vindral x servers.com story
