How to create an internet radio station
If you’ve ever wondered how internet radio stations work and/or wanted to create your own, this tutorial will show you how. It is actually very easy, and you can set up your own radio station and begin broadcasting songs in about 10 minutes.
First of all, let me give you a quick rundown on how it works. You have your music player (I will use Winamp, get it if you don’t have it) and you play your music as you normally would. You probably need a fast internet connection so you can broadcast without buffering occuring. Through a plugin (which you will download and install), Winamp will send the music you play to the broadcasting server (which can be on your PC or on another one with a larger connection), and the server sends the music to the listeners, reencoding it to a better format, if you are so inclined. Note that the amount of listeners you will be able to support is limited by your outgoing bandwidth and the bitrate of the song you are streaming, so if you’re streaming at 128 kbps and you have 256 kbps upload bandwidth, you’ll obviously be able to support 256/128 = 2 listeners.
The programs I use are Winamp for playing, oddcast DSP for broadcasting to the server and Icecast for serving. You can use Winamp’s own Shoutcast plugin and server, but I prefer to broadcast in Vorbis because it’s smaller and has much better quality than MP3.
Let’s get started, then. Download Icecast from this page (you presumably want the Windows version) and install it. Run it and click “Edit configuration” in the “Configuration” menu. A notepad window will pop up with various configuration options. My configuration is this:
<limits>
<clients>100</clients>
<sources>2</sources>
<threadpool>5</threadpool>
<queue-size>524288</queue-size>
<client-timeout>30</client-timeout>
<header-timeout>15</header-timeout>
<source-timeout>10</source-timeout>
<burst-on-connect>1</burst-on-connect>
<burst-size>65535</burst-size>
</limits>
<authentication>
<source-password>hackme</source-password>
<relay-password>hackme</relay-password>
<admin-user>admin</admin-user>
<admin-password>hackme</admin-password>
</authentication>
<hostname>localhost</hostname>
<listen-socket>
<port>8000</port>
</listen-socket>
<fileserve>1</fileserve>
<paths>
<basedir>./</basedir>
<logdir>./logs</logdir>
<webroot>./web</webroot>
<adminroot>./admin</adminroot>
<alias source="/" dest="/status.xsl"/>
</paths>
<logging>
<accesslog>access.log</accesslog>
<errorlog>error.log</errorlog>
<loglevel>4</loglevel> <!-- 4 Debug, 3 Info, 2 Warn, 1 Error -->
<logsize>10000</logsize> <!-- Max size of a logfile -->
</logging>
<security>
<chroot>0</chroot>
</security>
</icecast>
You can copy it and paste it in the open notepad window (the one with the configuration), but make sure you change “hackme” to more secure passwords. Once you have done this, save the file and close the window. Click the “Start server” button and the listboxes below should be populated with various information, like this:
Your server is now ready for people to connect to it, but there’s no music playing, so let’s tend to that. Download oddcast for Winamp from this page and install it. Now, run Winamp, go to the “DSP/Effect” section of the preferences and click on “oddcast DSP v3”. You should see the oddcast window pop up, looking something like this:
Click on “Add encoder” and a new encoder will be added in the box below. Right-click on it and select “configure”. A dialog will pop up, asking for various information. For “Encoder type” select “OggVorbis” (or MP3, if you are so inclined), this will make you stream in Vorbis. Some people might not be able to have the available codecs if they’re running a very old version of their player (all newer players worth their salt support Vorbis).
For “Quality” I have entered -2, it is the lowest quality, giving you about 30 kbps bitrate and very acceptable quality. You can experiment with 0 or 2, going over 6 is overkill in my opinion (since 6 is what I use to archive music from my CDs), and you will be able to support more listeners if you have lower bitrate for the song.
For “Server IP” enter the IP of the server you’re running Icecast on (it’s “localhost” if you’re running it on your own PC). “Server port” is whatever you entered in the configuration, 8000 if you used mine, and “Encoder password” is hopefully something other than “hackme”. I also use mono, because my connection only has 128 available upstream bandwidth and it doesn’t sound too bad. It should now look like this:
Click OK here and then click “Connect”. If you did everything right, the encoder should now connect to Icecast and begin streaming, like so:
If you want to do a voiceover (speak in your radio) just click the Live Recording button and it will broadcast anything that you say in the microphone (or whatever you enter as the input device). Click on it again to return to your normal music (I haven’t actually tested this, if there are any problems just comment here).
The “Source Level Stats” section of Icecast should also change to include your stream, and will look something like this:
Try connecting with another player (not the one playing the songs) to http://localhost:8000/stream.ogg (e.g. for Winamp click Open URL). If that connects and plays, everything is set up correctly. You can now tell people to connect with Winamp or whatever player they use (and NOT WITH AN INTERNET BROWSER) to http://[yourip]:8000/stream.ogg (if you don’t know your IP, visit http://www.whatismyip.com/, or see the “Client address” in the “Details” tab of your Local Area Connection if you want to stream on a LAN) with their players, and that’s all there was to it.
If you get a permission error under Vista, swamplingman suggested that you give your user full permissions for the Icecast and Winamp folders. That should solve the error.
Note: Before you broadcast any music, make sure you have the right to do so, otherwise you could be breaking the law of your country. Also, if you are having connection problems, you are probably behind a NAT or a firewall that does not allow other people to connect to your computer. To clarify, you (from your internal network) can only connect to your station using your internal IP (192.168.0.1 or whatever) and people from the internet can only connect to you using the IP from whatismyip.com and only if you have forwarded port 8000 corrrectly. Ask your network administrator or visit www.portforward.com for help, as these problems are outside the scope of this tutorial.
ive got it working and everything but i can only seem to pick my stream up on other winamp players and not windows media or even realplayer
Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on Mon, 19/06/2006 - 16:27.i want to play mp3 format but when i configure the encoder on Oddcast there are only three types of encoder ( Ogg vorbis, Ogg FLAC and AAC plus)
what do i do?!
thank you for the amazing guide
i've followed all the steps like suggested, but in Icecast, my source, source total/client connections and the connections/clients statistics show 0 instead of 1 like shown on this website. what's the cause and solution for this???
Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on Mon, 19/06/2006 - 22:28.it works fine, except for when i actually play music in winamp then it shuts down :( any ideas? (it all connects to Ice, but when i click 'play' for the song (yep, it's a .ogg) then it errors out.))
Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on Tue, 20/06/2006 - 23:56.Heloooooo.
Submitted by Darko (not verified) on Wed, 21/06/2006 - 15:53.I hawe make radio station with WMP and dont know howe to make showing my listeners what is playing ARTIST - TITLE...Howe to make to show what i
m playing in my radio THANKS???
Windows media player can't show the artist and song title but winamp can.
Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on Wed, 25/06/2008 - 17:46.hello i was just wondering who do i ask to let me do this would it be ntl as im on internet with themand it wont cost me will it
Submitted by jon (not verified) on Wed, 21/06/2006 - 20:58.thanks. jon.
This may be asking for too much, pipe dreaming if you will, however, I see that by using your computer as the server, and doing the 128 kbps with 256 upload bandwidth you can only support 2 listeners...:(. I know that if you use an external server then you can possibly increase that listener number. I want to be able to at least broadcast to 50 people... Is there a free or super cheap server out there that one can connect to with their radio broadcast software in order to allow more listeners. I'm not even sure what this service would be called, I guess stream hosting? I don't know, I'm brand new at all of this, but, bottom line, I'd like to be able to allow about 50 listeners.
Submitted by WildWilly (not verified) on Sun, 25/06/2006 - 09:28.No, not really. Google "shoutcast hosting".
Submitted by Stavros on Sun, 25/06/2006 - 10:05.---
Vidi, Vici, Veni.
http://freecast.co.uk/
These ppl will broadcast your server for free over their server.
Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on Sat, 15/07/2006 - 17:18.i play the url in winamp and it just says conecting... and does nothing...any suggestions? thanks
Submitted by Rick (not verified) on Wed, 28/06/2006 - 17:21.I did everything you said in your tutorial and everything seems to be going fine on my computer; Oddcast and Icecast are both connected. But, when I test it on another computer windows media player gives me this message:
"Windows Media Player cannot play the file because the server is not responding."
I used this address: http://[69.166.14.223]:8000/stream.mp3
Whatismyip.com told me that my ip address is 69.166.14.223 so I used it in the address. I also tried the address without the brakets (http://69.166.14.223:8000/stream.mp3). That did not work ether. I also disabled my firewall.
I have spent my last hour or so reading the comments of other people who read your tutorial and I have tried everything but I am stuck. Please Help!
P.S. Thanks for the great tutorial!
Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on Tue, 04/07/2006 - 21:33.When I did the configuration and then started the server all the numbers were 0.
We are trying to start a college radio station for the students and are having huge problems. We can't use the college's servers because theyre too protective over them and we can't find software easy enough to start 1 ourselves. Do you know of any where you can simply install it, make a playlist, set the times they should be played and it will then do it itself?
Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on Thu, 06/07/2006 - 10:02.I have everything set up exactly as stated. (copied the config file, have the settings exactly as you have, and done two full reinstalls) The station is being broadcast, bytes are being sent and received, and the server is receiving client connections (it lists the number in the stats section). But when a client connects, nothing is played, and there are no error messages. This is just on my local network for now; I've even opened port 8000 on my router.
Any ideas?
Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on Sat, 08/07/2006 - 18:49.Okay, I got my ip and stuff but what is my site?! I cant figure it out. Everytime i think i got it, it just the page doesnt show. DO i need to make a site for it?
Submitted by Robert (not verified) on Thu, 13/07/2006 - 21:17.How do you see how many people are listening?
Submitted by Mysterio320 on Fri, 14/07/2006 - 12:39.I just get 0's as values when I load icecast, even after configuring, and nothing happens with my peak meter - what's going wrong?
Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on Fri, 14/07/2006 - 15:30.Ok i got everything setup but it wint send anything
qwhen i set it up am i soupossed toonly say localhost or am i supossed to change that to my ip ?????
Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on Thu, 14/12/2006 - 20:24.My radio station url is: http://213.93.169.190:8000/stream.ogg
Submitted by Mysterio320 on Fri, 14/07/2006 - 20:48.Just checking..
I have a problem It keeps disconnecting.
Submitted by Mysterio320 on Sat, 15/07/2006 - 12:16.well that was happening to me. If it's when you start playing a song in Winamp, go through the configuration file again and make sure EVERY password is changed, not just the admin or another one. That fixed mine.
Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on Wed, 19/07/2006 - 00:54.I followed everything properly and everything works greay =D
Just a thought though, I run on a Dynamic IP (this means my IP address changes everytime i reconnect to the iternet).
Will this force me to change my URL everytime i reconnect?
P.S. Not trying to insult your intelligence by putting down a definition of a Dynamic IP
/Thanks Nath
Submitted by Nath (not verified) on Mon, 17/07/2006 - 22:20.I am curious but can this setup be used to create an internal Radio station or several with different Genre playing? Internal network runs 100MB/1GB and I have a large Audio library, I would like to setup several stations that play different music for the workers and phone system.
Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on Tue, 18/07/2006 - 22:09.My oddcast and winamp is working, and my icecast server is up and all, but when i go to 'source level stats' everything's blank except for "/stream.ogg". Shouldn't it have info about the song being played and all?
Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on Wed, 19/07/2006 - 01:16.Also, how do I check if it's working from my own computer? I've tried from another computer on my network (which has the same ip address) and I get response timeouts on it and my own computer. I know it's not working because i've asked other people to test too, but how will I know when it is working?
Everything is working as it should minus the live recording which stops the stream of music and to get it back you must disconnect the server. Not really a big deal but would be fun to play with peoples minds. I read it had something to with the version of winamp so if anyone gets it to work post your settings.
Also is it possible to run this behind a proxy server? I assume that can be done with icecast's config.
anyway sweet tutorial, thanks
Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on Thu, 20/07/2006 - 08:33.I defined the host adress as "myalias.no-ip.org" in both Icecast and oddcast.
The adress does route to the regular "localhost:8000/stream" (mp3) but comes up short when tested in both browsers and media players, that's to say I get slapped in the face by a "problem loading page" complaint. My ip's static. port 8000 is excluded from the list of blocked items in XP's firewall settings. The Icecast 2.3.1 package is installed in my inetpub/wwwroot folder, as I thought that might've been the problem disallowing my broadcast. Does it matter where you install Icecast at all?
When tested as localhost:8000/stream on my machine (locally) I get a page with a quicktime player that plays a few seconds of whatever I'm streaming at the moment but stalls thereafter and claims to be loading content, but never continues the playback.
I'm as of now not listed at icecast.org, although I defined the yp adress and the url stream to point to that whole xiph/../cgi-bin adress mentioned elsewhere.
Could this be an ISP issue?
Submitted by loosinghairfast (not verified) on Sun, 23/07/2006 - 23:28.Eagerly awaiting answers.
My URL doesnt work i don't think can yhew help me work this out as i am really annoyed at it not working
Submitted by Carly (not verified) on Thu, 27/07/2006 - 16:22.Hi.My radio station works great.When one person listen is ok.When 2 people listen the have problem.How can i do that to have many people without problems?
Submitted by adminkefas on Fri, 28/07/2006 - 11:35.Hi, I love your tutorial. It made everything so easy. I was going to do everything on Shout Cast and would of had to read pages upon pages of things. I'm a blonde and didn't get most of it. But your tutorial I understood. Thank you. ^^;
I have a question though; what if you want other people to be able to DJ on your station? Please e-mail me the answer to kaydey1230@aim.com, and please title it 'Your Answer' or I will think its junk. Loves, bye. <3
Submitted by Bieoncia (not verified) on Thu, 03/08/2006 - 09:43.I would also like to know this answer, so please dont email it and post it on thie Forum kinda thing =D
/thx nath
Submitted by Nathan (not verified) on Fri, 04/08/2006 - 18:59.I used the http://67.177.147.196:8000/stream.ogg link you gave, but it says that it Can't Display the Page. Whats with that? I also put the []'s around the IP and it still didn't help. When you e-mail me the answer to the other question, could you please explain this as well?<3
Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on Thu, 03/08/2006 - 09:46.I have the exact same problem can someone email me at gcrules_27@hotmail.com, thanks.
Submitted by Jojo (not verified) on Mon, 20/11/2006 - 01:24.What needs write to encoder configuration in mountpoint?Then i starting palying music than i'm disconecting from oddcast.
Submitted by DiPsO (not verified) on Fri, 04/08/2006 - 20:19.By that, i mean, no one can connect to my station. I did everything right though, and i put the right set up, and tried different set ups, with the ip address. I tried making it mp3 and ogg..something, whatever that other option is. Nothing. It has to work though, the server set up says it's running, and so does oddcastv3. I didn't miss anything, since i started from scratch twice now. Is there something i could have missed? Or maybe a way to better test this?
Submitted by infektidblood (not verified) on Sat, 05/08/2006 - 06:54.For those that endeavor to start an Internet radio station, getting the server setup is still only only one half of the equation. Licensing is still mandatory to legally stream music online in the United States. (Webcasting without license even just for leisure constitutes copyright infringement.) Just a word of advice.
Submitted by rkrause on Tue, 08/08/2006 - 04:48.Hello.. I have a question you know where u said that we will have a /stream. something in roder for it to work.. for some reason when I click Source Level Stats.. its blank PLEASE HELP!
Submitted by Kat (not verified) on Wed, 09/08/2006 - 02:12.Can anyone help please. Everytime someone tries to listen to me, it keeps telling them "timed out" how can i avoid this and get it to work ?
Submitted by Matt (not verified) on Sun, 13/08/2006 - 20:00.i have followed the instructions as per the page above but the listners are able to connect. But they are able to ping my system IP. I am using a Desktop PC as a broadcasting server. What are the things i should check ? please help.
Submitted by Deepak (not verified) on Tue, 22/08/2006 - 17:56.hi my question is when I start broadcasting, it actually start downloading on the other end instead of broadasting the music or my live voice. how to fix this problem
Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on Mon, 28/08/2006 - 06:38.Hi,
This is the same problem i am facing, the player at the listener end is supposed to buffer the stream and play at the same time. Can some one help us on that please.
a mail on deep@digivosinfoscribe.com will be very help full.
Submitted by Deep (not verified) on Mon, 28/08/2006 - 11:17.same here!!!!!
Aaron
SLVPodcast
Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on Thu, 12/04/2007 - 13:59.Are you sure the player is winamp/has ogg support?
Submitted by Stavros on Thu, 12/04/2007 - 14:19.---
Vidi, Vici, Veni.
HOW AND WHERE DO I FIND MY RADIO STATION?!?!?!?!
Submitted by Andy (not verified) on Thu, 31/08/2006 - 17:58.how can you get people to go on the stream?
i can go to it myself by the http://localhost.com/stream.wmv
but i want others on the internet to view it as well. i tried putting my ip that i got from the site in the url but it said "paid took too long to load"
=/
Submitted by Flameking (not verified) on Fri, 01/09/2006 - 02:29.hioe l have followed all your instructions on how to set up the radio station. All works ok on my side except on lcecast the source level stats are blank. There is nothing shown in that box. Also my listeners cannot loginto the station after clicking http://[yourip]:8000/stream.ogg. l have replaced [yourip] with my computer ip address. My listeners keep getting an error message that the page is not found. l have Enabled port 8000 and there is no firewall blocking it. #please help
Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on Sat, 02/09/2006 - 14:24.hie, l have followed all your instructions on how to set up the radio station. All works ok on my side except on lcecast the source level stats are blank. There is nothing shown in that box. Also my listeners cannot loginto the station after clicking http://[yourip]:8000/stream.ogg. l have replaced [yourip] with my computer ip address. My listeners keep getting an error message that the page is not found. l have Enabled port 8000 and there is no firewall blocking it. #please help
Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on Sat, 02/09/2006 - 14:26.I have configured icecast and oddcast. I have changed all the passwords, and set all the ports and ip addresses up to point to my machine. When I try to connect in oddcast, it disconnects me immediately. I have forwarded port 8000 for the machine running the server and it still disconnects. I've even hardcoded my IP in for localhost. Win XP and Sygate have been configured to allow all traffic with icecast. Any ideas what could be keeping me from connecting? Thanks!
Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on Tue, 05/09/2006 - 23:38.I have exactly the same problem as the guy above me, I configured everything, but it still doesn't seem to work..
Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on Fri, 15/09/2006 - 09:35.I have actually found out Oddcast tells it connected, when I paused my music. But as soon as I press play it disconnects
Got any clue why?
Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on Fri, 15/09/2006 - 10:02.If i use this radio station can people listen to it on WMP?
Submitted by Pete (not verified) on Fri, 22/09/2006 - 15:30.hi i would also like to know ,if using the method above, will i be able to listen to it on Windows Media Player.
I have tried but it just came up url not found.
If i can listen to it through windows media player could somebody plz help me to try and work out what is going on.
If not can someone please help me find an alternative that i can listen to through window media player
thanx
Submitted by dragonchick (not verified) on Tue, 17/10/2006 - 16:39.:)