Could you please briefly describe how to go from auto dj to live?
You just point your source client to the sc_trans2 instance's IP address using the 'djport' (or 'djport2') port (explained below). When sc_trans2 accepts the DJ connection, it will automatically crossfade over to the live stream. When the DJ disconnects, it will crossfade back to the autoDJ.
Your username/password for the live encoder should be that of one of the DJ accounts you created in Centova Cast. Make sure you set the priority for the DJ account so that it's higher than the autoDJ, otherwise it won't switch over automatically. (I don't know for sure -- it's not documented by Nullsoft -- but I assume the priority for non-DJ logins like the autoDJ is 1, so you would want your DJs to have a priority greater than 1.)
I see most people use WiaAmp to connect, I use Sam but my version does not have support for SHOUTcast 2, however I think that the way it works through different ports for auto dj and live would mean I can still use my version of Sam.
Yup, my understanding (bearing in mind that I'm not a Nullsoft staffer
) is that it allows connections from both v1 and v2 source clients. So if you're using a source client that's designed for ShoutCast v1 you connect to 'djport'... if you're using one that's designed for ShoutCast v2 you connect to 'djport2'.
And with the mount points, I see - as a server admin we can now set the amount of mount points each user has, or set them to unlimited. Could you please also kind of tell me how that works
If there's something in particular about this feature that I can clarify let me know.. otherwise... the limit on the number of mount points specifies, as you might expect, the number of mount points the client can create.
I assume a client could in fact stream mp3 and aac+ format, and even multiple bit rates for each
Yes, ShoutCast v2 supports multiple mount points now, just like IceCast has done for years, so they can use any combination of codecs supported by the ShoutCast (or IceCast) server.
back several years ago the only way was to set up a encoder, not many stream hosts provided this service, I guess now these are kinda built into v2.
No, you still need an encoder for each mount point. Mount points just let a single server instance serve multiple, independent streams... they don't provide any functionality beyond that. So you could create mount points called /rock and /pop, and put a totally different audio stream on each. Or you could create, say, /low and /high and put a low-bandwidth version of your stream on one, and high-bandwidth on the other. But regardless of how you set it up, each mount point still needs its own encoder.
If you're using the autoDJ, then the autoDJ is the encoder (just as it was for single-mountpoint ShoutCast v1 installations). If you're not using the autoDJ, you'd have to have a separate encoder hosted elsewhere (SAM Broadcaster or whatever) for each mount point. The reason there's an option to limit the number of mount points is because if the client has autoDJ privileges and decides to use the autoDJ for multiple mount points, each autoDJ-based mount point is going to require the CPU resources that were typically required for an entire station in ShoutCast v1. So a stream with 2 mount points, both autoDJ-based, will require the same resources as two ShoutCast v1 autoDJ-based streams.