Setting Up Your Station
Are you ready to start your own radio station? If you're planning to use SHOUTcast on the Windows platform, this technical walk-through will get you there.

Requirements
Before you spend valuable time setting up SHOUTcast, you need to know whether it's going to work when you are finished. DO NOT install until you have answered these questions!

• Do you have enough upstream bandwidth to host a station?
• Do you have access to the Admin area of your router or DSL Modem?

If the answer to either of the above questions is "No", then you are done. You must either pay for a stream host, or find another hobby.

STEP 1 : Testing Upstream Bandwidth
Find out if you can host SHOUTcast by following the link below...
http://www.testmy.net/u_load.php and clicking the "SmarTest" link.

When the test has completed, you will see a page that includes your connection speed. You care about the number circled in the screenshot below...

The result of the test is very important. Use the number you received to find out how many listeners your station can support. The "Quality" is how good your station will sound when a listener tunes in. For MP3 streaming, here's a guide...

What can your station support?
Use this calculator to figure out what your best case scenario is for listeners. Enter the numeric value of your speed test results and the type of quality you want based on the chart above and we'll tell you what your connection can handle.
24k 32k 56k 64k 96k 128k Stream Bitrate (From table above)
Your UPLOAD Speed (From testmy.net)