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Is it my video card or are youtube files not meant to be downloaded?

post #1 of 9
3/17/10 at 9:57pm
Thread Starter 
Hi.
I have an old athlon 4 computer that is 995mhz. But i have 1 gig of ram - which is not so bad for an old computer. My video card is an ATI rage 182. My motherboard is an ECS K7S5A V 1.1. My sound card = Creative es1373.
I'm using Windows XP.

Anyway.... because I am currently using dialup, I download youtube videos instead of watching them live. I donwload them using a program called Orbit grab.

When I download them at 360p, everything seems to be find when I play them back. The audio and video are in sync. BUT... when I download them in 480p, the video almost always (or always) seems to lag behind the audio, quite terribly. Sometimes it will briefly catch up I think.

Why is this happening? Would these flv (flash) files I have saved do this on any computer or is it my video card? Or is it the speed of my computer?? Should I maybe be using a different program to play them back? The 360p flv files seem to play better in a player i have called Gom Player than they do in Windows Media Player 11.

But with the higher quality - 480p files i've downloaded, the video lags way behind the audio in both Gom Player and Windows Media Player.

How do i make the 480p files i've downloaded from Youtube play in sync? Or is it a flaw with Youtube?

Or is there a there a better program to play flash files back where the video won't lag behind the audio?

Please help.
Thanks!
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post #2 of 9
3/18/10 at 11:15am
When I d/l an HD version of a y-t video it's always shows as am mp4 file with the Quicktime icon beside it. Maybe try playing with Quicktime and see if the audio lags.
BTW, I use the Firefox add on DownloadHelper when d/l-ing tube vids..
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post #3 of 9
3/18/10 at 12:28pm
Thread Starter 
Quote:
Originally Posted by Westly-C View Post

When I d/l an HD version of a y-t video it's always shows as am mp4 file with the Quicktime icon beside it. Maybe try playing with Quicktime and see if the audio lags.
BTW, I use the Firefox add on DownloadHelper when d/l-ing tube vids..

Westly-C: Thanks....

I will try downloading quicktime. But if I end up getting high speed, won't the higher quality videos lag the same way if i try to stream them live on youtube?

And would using the firefox add on have any difference in the end result of the downloaded file? I'm guessing it would still be the same file, no?
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post #4 of 9
3/18/10 at 1:20pm
Quote:


But if I end up getting high speed, won't the higher quality videos lag the same way if i try to stream them live on youtube?

Connection speed shouldn't be the cause of the problem. If the audio lag is caused by the program you're using to d/l with, you'll have the same problem, so determining whether it's the fault is the video player you're using, or a problem with the files themselves is the priority now.
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post #5 of 9
3/18/10 at 11:05pm
Thread Starter 
Quote:
Originally Posted by Westly-C View Post

Connection speed shouldn't be the cause of the problem. If the audio lag is caused by the program you're using to d/l with, you'll have the same problem, so determining whether it's the fault is the video player you're using, or a problem with the files themselves is the priority now.


It's the video that is lagging... behind the audio.
What I meant, Westly, is that if the lag is caused by my slow 995mhz processor as some people have told me it might be, then if i get high speed internet and watch the videos live on youtube won't i have the same video lag as i do when i am watching them in windows media player or gom player or real player?

And in regards to your other point: Would downloading them with a different program other than Orbit (which i am using now) actually result in the file being any different? Wouldn't it be the same file no matter which program i used to download the flv files??

And ps:

I downloaded a program called The KMPlayer. And the hq videos that lagged in all the other players don't seem to lag using this program! Wow!
But... do u think that if i get high speed internet and try to watch youtube videos the way you are meant to - streaming live - the video will lag because of my processor.....??

-D.
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post #6 of 9
3/19/10 at 9:20am
Quote:
Originally Posted by scissorhands View Post

It's the video that is lagging... behind the audio.
What I meant, Westly, is that if the lag is caused by my slow 995mhz processor as some people have told me it might be, then if i get high speed internet and watch the videos live on youtube won't i have the same video lag as i do when i am watching them in windows media player or gom player or real player?

Okay, I'm not a pc whiz, but I think my old computer was a near 800mhz processor, and it worked with no issue on the lowest level high speed internet tier. So my first reaction is to say you shouldn't have a problem using your pc with broadband internet.
What version of Windows Media player are you using? The more I'm hearing, the more it sounds like that may be the problem, as well as it may need updated codecs to play your videos. Many youtube videos are, when uploaded, transferred to the FLV file format, if you haven't updated your media players, you can experience studdering playback.

Quote:


And in regards to your other point: Would downloading them with a different program other than Orbit (which i am using now) actually result in the file being any different? Wouldn't it be the same file no matter which program i used to download the flv files??

No, the file would be the same, I was just offering that up as a suggestion, in case this Orbit program-which I've never heard of, may be the cause.
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post #7 of 9
3/19/10 at 11:09am
My first guess is that your PC is probably too slow to decode the 480p files at full speed. These codecs are more processor intensive than the older mpeg or divx avi, which you might be able to play fine at that resolution.

First, try playing the files with VLC from http://www.videolan.org/vlc/. VLC has it's own decoder and is good at playing files that other players have problems with. If you still have playback issues with VLC, then you probably don't have enough horsepower. After VLC you could also try using the ffdshow decoder http://www.videohelp.com/tools/ffdshow with Media Player Classic http://www.videohelp.com/tools/Media_Player_Classic.

In my experience, the Quicktime decoder on Windows requires an even faster CPU than the others for smooth playback, so I wouldn't recommend it if the others don't play well.

If you want to try a different downloader, Downloadhelper for Firefox works well and gives you options of mp4 and flv https://addons.mozilla.org/firefox/addon/3006.

If none of these suggestions improve your playback, I think you'll have to stick with the lower-res videos or upgrade your PC.
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post #8 of 9
3/19/10 at 12:37pm
Wymann is right.

Time to upgrade, dude. My computer is virtually the same: (same motherboard, Athlon processor, 512 Mb RAM!) built it a decade ago myself and it was low end then. I can stream video all right most of the time, but I never use U-Tube so can't speak to that.

It's an ancient piece of crap, just like yours. It works for me because I use Ubuntu so I don't have to wait forever for start-up and I am mostly reading stuff on the internet rather than watching stuff. Even spending a few hundred bucks will get you a machine light years ahead of the one you have now.

The VLC suggestion is a good one, try that too.
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post #9 of 9
10/20/11 at 6:49am
VLC is a good piece of software. I prefer to use this for my FLV player. I love how easy it is to also convert my videos to formats I can play on other devices like my phone.
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