OnLive: How does it work? [closed]

Question

OnLive is a cloud computing solution for gaming. It offers streaming of high-end games to any pc, regardless of its hardware. I wonder how it works: sending raw HD res image and audio data seems unlikely. Would relatively simple compression, like jpeg and mp3/ogg, do the trick?

Answer 1

Have you read this article? Excerpts thereof:

It's essentially the gaming version of cloud computing - everything is computed, rendered and housed online. In its simplest description, your controller inputs are uploaded, a high-end server takes your inputs and plays the game, and then a video stream of the output is sent back to your computer. Think of it as something like Youtube or Hulu for games.

The service works with pretty much any Windows or Mac machine as a small browser plug-in. Optionally, you will also be able to purchase a small device, called the OnLive MicroConsole, that you can hook directly into your TV via HDMI, though if your computer supports video output to your TV, you can just do it that way instead. Of course, you can also just play on your computer's display if you don't want to pipe it out to your living room set.

[...]

OnLive has worked diligently to overcome lag issues. The first step in this was creating a video compression algorithm that was as quick as possible.