Reasons to use RTP when streaming a pre-existing file?

Question

The only reason I could think of for using RTP to transfer a pre-existing file is if you're trying to monitor the amount of time a user is streaming the file, like if you're running a time-based On-Demand website. The other streaming-solution i know of is to use HTTP to upload a media file, then providing a client to progressively play the file. Can anyone come up with another reason to use RTP to stream media files?

Answer 1

You don't use RTP to transfer files, you use RTP to stream media to media players.

If you want to serve media RTP has some advantages:

• RTP capable clients can use the stream, they might not be able to use whatever else you come up with.
• Tolerates network congestion. If you serve the data over a TCP connection, the stream is quite sensible to packet loss and congestion. TCP has long timeouts and you might experience stalls.