Useful Links to BBC Real Audio and Windows Media Player Files and Listen Again

[Josh]

Since the roll out of the BBC iplayer getting the real audio links to BBC radio programming and listen again is tricky via the BBC website. This difficulty is due to the BBC iplayer opting to play via the flash feed rather than Real Audio or WMA files, so you can't catch the address and use it.

Why would you want to play these feeds on anything other than the BBC iplayer, answer if you have a mobile device, phone, PDA that doesn't support the BBC propertory player. Imagine foreign parts, free wifi link in the hotel, nothing on TV and an urge to listen to R3, R4, World Service [two feeds] or your BBC local radio station...

A useful site is this:

http://www.beebotron.org/index.php?reload

The guys behind it publish the real audio links, windows media files links and listen again links, producing their own ASCII friendly screen for those mobile devices that need things simple. Real audio players for mobile devices can be down loaded from the net. The BBC only provides the 7 day listen again in either real audio mode via links that you can't access or the BBC iplayer.

To pick up BBC real audio stations you just need the RAM files held in a directory by name R1, R2 etc.

The real time links all fall in this area:

RealAudio links

International - Real - 1Xtra
International - Real - 6 Music
International - Real - BBC 7
International - Real - Radio 1
International - Real - Radio 2
International - Real - Radio 3
International - Real - Radio 4 FM
International - Real - Radio 4 LW
International - Real - Five Live
International - Real - Five Live Sports Extra
International - Real - Radio Wales
International - Real - Radio Scotland
International - Real - Radio Ulster
International - Real - World Service (Option 1)
International - Real - World Service (Option 2)
International - Real - World Service (Option 3)
International - Real - World Service (Option 4)

You click on the link or create a RAM file using the notepad by entering one of the links.

Example BBC World Service Option 1

rtsp://a243.l3944150242.c39441.g.lr.akamaistream.net/live/D/243/39441/v0001/reflector:50242

putting this in a file with an extension RAM.

The World Service links are less reliable and this seems to be one of the few places where they are published. May be too many people are accessing them. They do work if you wait long enough for the World Service.

The Windows Media files are also listed as well so just a question of storing the ASX files in your mobile device.

Another useful site is this one:

https://www.ripcaster.co.uk/node/111

I'm sure there are many more sites around, but the Beebotron seems to be a good one for a friendly wrapped real audio site to use whilst on the move.

I would be interested to hear what success people have outside the UK on these ones.

BTW Voice of America is

rtsp://a1327.r.akareal.net/ondemand/7/1327/2110/973023381/voice.download.akamai.com/2110/real/voa/english/nnow/audio/NNOW_HEADLINES2300a0914.rm

Obviously we can't be UK centric and everybody needs to take a nap.

[Josh]

OK these links have changed:

International - Real - 1Xtra
International - Real - 6 Music
International - Real - BBC 7
International - Real - Radio 1
International - Real - Radio 2
International - Real - Radio 3
International - Real - Radio 4 FM
International - Real - Radio 4 LW
International - Real - Five Live
International - Real - Five Live Sports Extra
International - Real - Radio Wales
International - Real - Radio Scotland
International - Real - Radio Ulster

Seems that nothing is constant.... The World Service one is OK, that comes out from a different address. See attached for ones that do work, but perhaps only in the UK ?.

An alternative to Beebotron is this site, that also has a mobile version:

http://www.iplayerconverter.co.uk/

The Listen Again is indexed differently. Both these Listen Again play backs in Real Audio can be used abroad, checking via VPN in the states.

Alternative Real Audio links for BBC national radio for the real time service I copied across from the BBC web site when the IPlayer wasn't loaded - not too sure whether these are playable to non UK based IP addresses. They don't seem to work for me. Feel free to confirm.

Changing tack to WMA listen live link files, the International ones run at no greater than 48k, so if you save a list of files to use abroad then you need a set for the international ones and ones for the UK, with the higher bit rate. You can use a VPN pipe to sort this out so that the BBC site thinks you are off shore and deliver back the WMA link. Using a mobile device without the BBC iplayer loaded you get to decide which player to use, real audio or windows media.

[Josh]

A bit more back story from the BBC:

Improvements to BBC Local Radio online

Ian Myatt Ian Myatt | 15:30 UK time, Wednesday, 19 August 2009

It was a proud day last November when we finally integrated all our local radio stations into the BBC iPlayer. However, as the more observant will have noticed, the audio remained in the same format, Realmedia.

Although our UK wide national stations have been using Flash-based streams for some time it has taken a significant amount of re-engineering behind the scenes to expand use of this technology to all of our nations and local radio stations.

In December we introduced MP3 format to the on demand programmes from our nations stations (Radio Scotland, Nan Gaidheal, Wales, Cymru, Ulster and Foyle), and as of today I am pleased announce that we have extended this to all 40 of our English local radio stations.

So now, when you listen to on demand programmes from any of our radio stations there will be no need for any additional software providing Flash is already installed on your machine.

The improvements don't stop there, in the autumn we will be upgrading all of our live radio streams to the AAC format, and for WiFi radio users we'll also be offering streams in Windows Media.

One of the major problems we have still to overcome is the quality of our source audio for the streams. By their nature, local radio stations are, well, local and thus the emphasis has always been placed on distribution to the local transmitter. As a result we don't currently have high quality feeds of all of our stations in a centralised location and instead the audio used for the streams aggregated through a variety of different methods with varying degrees of quality. Sorting this out will be one of our next challenges!

Watch this space for further developments.

Ian Myatt is Executive Product Manager, Nations & English Regions

&

As of the week commencing Monday 21 September 2009, live streaming of local BBC radio stations is no longer available in Real Media format. This format has been replaced by Flash and Windows Media (WMA).

Flash is now the default playback format for listening live to local radio stations in iPlayer.

The Windows Media files are here:

Network 	URL
Radio Cymru 	http://bbc.co.uk/radio/listen/live/rc.asx
Radio Foyle 	http://bbc.co.uk/radio/listen/live/rf.asx
Radio nan Gaidheal 	http://bbc.co.uk/radio/listen/live/rng.asx 
Radio Scotland 	http://bbc.co.uk/radio/listen/live/rs.asx
Radio Ulster 	http://bbc.co.uk/radio/listen/live/ru.asx
Radio Wales 	http://bbc.co.uk/radio/listen/live/rw.asx
BBC Berkshire 	http://bbc.co.uk/radio/listen/live/bbcberkshire.asx
BBC Bristol 	http://bbc.co.uk/radio/listen/live/bbcbristol.asx 
BBC Cambridgeshire 	http://bbc.co.uk/radio/listen/live/b...ridgeshire.asx 
BBC Cornwall 	http://bbc.co.uk/radio/listen/live/bbccornwall.asx
BBC Coventry & Warwickshire 	

http://bbc.co.uk/radio/listen/live/b...rwickshire.asx
BBC Cumbria 	http://bbc.co.uk/radio/listen/live/bbccumbria.asx
BBC Derby 	http://bbc.co.uk/radio/listen/live/bbcderby.asx
BBC Devon 	http://bbc.co.uk/radio/listen/live/bbcdevon.asx
BBC Es*** 	http://bbc.co.uk/radio/listen/live/bbces***.asx
BBC Gloucestershire 	http://bbc.co.uk/radio/listen/live/b...estershire.asx
BBC Guernsey 	http://bbc.co.uk/radio/listen/live/bbcguernsey.asx
BBC Hereford & Worcester 	http://bbc.co.uk/radio/listen/live/b...dworcester.asx
BBC Humberside 	http://bbc.co.uk/radio/listen/live/bbchumberside.asx
BBC Jersey 	http://bbc.co.uk/radio/listen/live/bbcjersey.asx
BBC Kent 	http://bbc.co.uk/radio/listen/live/bbckent.asx
BBC Lancashire 	http://bbc.co.uk/radio/listen/live/bbclancashire.asx
BBC Leeds 	http://bbc.co.uk/radio/listen/live/bbcleeds.asx
BBC Leicester 	http://bbc.co.uk/radio/listen/live/bbcleicester.asx
BBC Lincolnshire 	http://bbc.co.uk/radio/listen/live/bbclincolnshire.asx
BBC London 	http://bbc.co.uk/radio/listen/live/bbclondon.asx
BBC Manchester 	

http://bbc.co.uk/radio/listen/live/bbcmanchester.asx
BBC Merseyside 	

http://bbc.co.uk/radio/listen/live/bbcmerseyside.asx 
BBC Newcastle 	http://bbc.co.uk/radio/listen/live/bbcnewcastle.asx
BBC Norfolk 	http://bbc.co.uk/radio/listen/live/bbcnorfolk.asx
BBC Northampton 	http://bbc.co.uk/radio/listen/live/bbcnorthampton.asx
BBC Nottingham 	http://bbc.co.uk/radio/listen/live/bbcnottingham.asx
BBC Oxford 	http://bbc.co.uk/radio/listen/live/bbcoxford.asx 
BBC Sheffield 	http://bbc.co.uk/radio/listen/live/bbcsheffield.asx 
BBC Shropshire 	http://bbc.co.uk/radio/listen/live/bbcshropshire.asx 
BBC Solent 	http://bbc.co.uk/radio/listen/live/bbcsolent.asx 
BBC Somerset 	http://bbc.co.uk/radio/listen/live/bbcsomerset.asx
BBC Stoke 	http://bbc.co.uk/radio/listen/live/bbcstoke.asx
BBC Suffolk 	http://bbc.co.uk/radio/listen/live/bbcsuffolk.asx 
BBC Surrey 	http://bbc.co.uk/radio/listen/live/bbcsurrey.asx
BBC Sus*** 	http://bbc.co.uk/radio/listen/live/bbcsus***.asx
BBC Tees 	http://bbc.co.uk/radio/listen/live/bbctees.asx
BBC Three Counties 	http://bbc.co.uk/radio/listen/live/bbcthreecounties.asx
BBC Wiltshire 	http://bbc.co.uk/radio/listen/live/bbcwiltshire.asx 
BBC WM 	http://bbc.co.uk/radio/listen/live/bbcwm.asx
BBC York 	http://bbc.co.uk/radio/listen/live/bbcyork.asx

World Service

Windows Media
BBC World Service 	http://www.bbc.co.uk/worldservice/me...fent_au_nb.asx 	 
BBC World Service - English News 	http://www.bbc.co.uk/worldservice/me...news_au_nb.asx 	 
BBC Arabic 	http://www.bbc.co.uk/arabic/meta/tx/...live_au_nb.asx 	 
BBC Russian 	http://www.bbc.co.uk/russian/meta/tx...live_au_nb.asx 	 
Other languages 	Not available

 

Real Media
BBC World Service 	http://www.bbc.co.uk/worldservice/me...fent_au_nb.ram 	 
BBC World Service - English News 	http://www.bbc.co.uk/worldservice/me...news_au_nb.ram 	 
BBC Arabic 	http://www.bbc.co.uk/arabic/meta/tx/...live_au_nb.ram 	 
BBC Russian 	http://www.bbc.co.uk/russian/meta/tx...live_au_nb.ram 	 
Other languages 	Not available

I find the World Service media players don't play but the real audio ones with the links I gave previously do.