Video Downloading from Youtube and the sort, a step by step process

[Stalker]

Ok. Some of you may be like me. You see video on a site like youtube and want to download it to keep safe for all of time, but how do you do it? Well, here's how


Start by going to www.download.com and doing a search for Tube Sucker

Click the link for the most current version (Should be the only one showing). Download and install the program.

ok, now you're gonna need a codec to be able to view these downloaded files, so let's make sure you have some good audio codecs.

Go to http://www.free-codecs.com/K_Lite_Co...k_download.htm and download the newest FULL version of the codec. It's gonna make you close all internet pages, so you might as well do that as soon as you start installing the program.

Ok, now the fun part. In your programs list, you should have a program called Tube Sucker (pretty sneaky huh?). Open the one that says "Shortcut to Tube Sucker.exe"

The window opens. You can do one of two things. You can type your search in the top box (If you know what you're exactly looking for), or in the long box you can type in the address of the site that you want to go to (Www.youtube.com etc.)


Once you find the video that you want, toward the top there's a box that says "download this video" Click it!

Poof, now in the "My Videos" folder of your my documents will be the video!

[Stalker]

Here's how you can make the videos able to be played on any computer. Just do this, burn it to a cd, or put it on a flash drive, or however you want to transfer it, but any computer made after 2002 should have no problems playing it.

I use the RivaFLVencoder;
http://www.rivavx.com/index.php?encoder&L=3
which is freeware and it’s based on the FFMPEG encoder (normally it is used to create .flv files from .avi or .mpg, but it can do the reverse too).
There is also FlixPro by Wildform, but that costs about $150.

Download, install and open Riva.

[Stalker]

Klick the Browse button in the Input tab and locate the .flv file you want to convert.

Klick the Browse button in the Output tab to select the location to save your output.




The default outputname will have the extension .flv (after all it is an FLV encoder) but just click it and change the extension to .avi or .mpg

In this image, you see in the output that it shows vidAXP002_256.avi. Originally it would have had vidAXP002_256.flv. What you want to do is name the file how you want it to be named then add .mpg or .avi (mpg is more recognized by players)

[Stalker]

Then adjust the encoding parameters for both video and audio to your liking
I personally take the resolution to the highest. The framerate and bitrate you can play with as much as you want to. I tend to leave the audio the way it is originally. When people upload to youtube and the sort, it gets so distorted that the audio blows to begin with, improving it in this compression just means that the amount it blows will probably be more noticeable to you.

[Stalker]

Make sure you check the box Enable Audio or you’ll end up with a mute video.

It’s possible that the .flv contains an audiocodec that will not be transcoded. A solution for that is to play the original .flv and record the audio with Audacity (for instance) and to mux that recording with the .avi or .mpg you get from Riva.

Just experiment with the settings, but don’t expect miracles.

With the correct settings, you can now hit the Encode button

[Stalker]

I'm going to start testing other converters to see what I can do to find a better one that doesn't lose as much quality, but that's gonna be difficult.

[black_cobra_95]

thx good info

[86GT50]

Do you know how to save a youtube video as music file only???? Say there is a youtube video of an old song & I only want the music. How can I save it so I can play it back as a wave or mp3 file?????

[Stalker]

You would have to get a program to pull the audio file out of the video. I'm not sure how to exactly go about doing that.

[86GT50]

Thanks Stalked R/T
I did some researching from what you suggested & came up with the following, thought you'd be interested in it.
http://www.aoamedia.com/audioextractor.htm
It's a program that pulls the audio & converts it to a playable format
Thanks again
Tony