Patent ID: 7908412

Claim:
An apparatus that transmits media content to one or more receiving devices, the apparatus comprising: a processor; a first master buffer associated with a first receiving device, the first master buffer configured to compress the media content according to a first compression scheme; a second master buffer associated with a second receiving device, the second master buffer configured to compress the media content according to a second compression scheme; a plurality of slave buffers to store corresponding packets of the media content; a buffer management component comprising computer-executable instructions executable by the processor to: receive the packets of the media content to be buffered; determine whether one of the first and second master buffers has been established for the packets of the media content; allocate at least one of the plurality of slave buffers to store the packets of the media content based in part on similarity in size of the allocated slave buffer and size of the packets of the media content when the first master buffer has been established for the packets of the media content; link the at least one allocated slave buffer with the established first master buffer, the linking comprising associating at least one set of link elements in the established first master buffer comprising one or more of pointers, tables, and linked lists; share the at least one allocated slave buffer with the second master buffer by associating at least another set of link elements in the second master buffer comprising one or more of pointers, tables, and linked lists; and send at least some of the packets of the media content from the at least one allocated slave buffer to the first receiving device and the second receiving device.