Patent ID: 8195829

Claim:
A streaming media player for receiving from a server a media stream as an input and for generating a corresponding media stream as an output, the media player comprising: a clock comparator arranged to compare a clock value of a server from which a media stream is received as an input with a clock value of the player, and to generate a clock state value representing how much the server's clock value lags or leads the player's clock value; an output component arranged to generate an output media stream corresponding to said input media stream; and, a rate component arranged to receive a said clock state value from the clock comparator and to vary the rate of output of the media stream from the output component in dependency on the clock state value, wherein the rate component is arranged to vary the rate of output of the media stream from the output component according to the formula: s=m ( SC ( t )− PC ( t ))/( SC ( t )− SC ( t− 1)) where: s is the speed up or slow down ratio with respect to the original rate of output; m is the maximum allowable slow down ratio with respect to the original rate of output; PC(t) is the player's clock value at sampling time t; and, SC(t) is the server's clock value at sampling time t.