Youtube is at it again - this time, no HD

[JimmiG]

Another day, another new problem with Youtube.

This time, many videos refuse to play in anything except the default 480p, even though 720/1080p is available. When I change the resolution, the "HD" text appears in small red print by the cogwheel button, and the cogwheel icon itself starts spinning. However the video clearly never changes to HD.

Is this how they solved the buffering issues they were having this spring?

 

[tommo123]

it's crappy. oddly it takes less time to download the 720p or 1080p than it does to buffer it

 

[olds]

The tube sucks. I have a 25MB connection and I still have to buffer.

https://chrome.google.com/webstore/...outube/lnkdbjbjpnpjeciipoaflmpcddinpjjp?hl=en

 

[olds]

dp

 

[MustISO]

I've really never used YouTube much until recently and what I've discovered is that it's a crap shoot if the video is going to stutter or play the HD version and Flash Player is the biggest hunk of crap. If the video plays in native HTML5 without Flash it's perfect, with Flash it's a mess.

 

[tcG]

OP, pretty sure your problem will be remedied by manually dragging the seek bar to the part of the video you want after changing to HD resolution.

 

[MontyAC]

I have no problem getting HD.

 

[Puppies04]

I have a problem with something, I have done absolutely nothing about this problem so it must be someone elses fault.

 

[yllus]

It's likely not YouTube's fault - it's probably your ISP. Call them and threaten to cancel if your video experience online continues to be this poor.

Ars Technica - Why YouTube buffers: The secret deals that make—and break—online video

...

These business decisions involve "peering" agreements that Internet companies make to pass traffic from one to another and negotiations over caching services that store videos closer to people's homes so they can load faster in your browser. When Internet providers refuse to upgrade peering connections, traffic gets congested. When ISPs refuse to use the caching services offered by the likes of Google and Netflix, video has to travel farther across the Internet to get to its final destination—your living room.

...

Instead, network operators can degrade traffic by failing to upgrade connections without severing them entirely. The public won't realize that's what's going on unless negotiations become so contentious that one party makes them public—or a government decides to investigate.

Degraded connections disproportionately affect the quality of streaming video because video requires far more bits than most other types of traffic. Netflix and YouTube alone account for nearly half of all Internet traffic to homes in North America during peak hours, according to research by SandVine. And customers are far more likely to be annoyed by a video that stutters and stops than by a webpage taking a few extra seconds to load.

 

[JimmiG]

OP, pretty sure your problem will be remedied by manually dragging the seek bar to the part of the video you want after changing to HD resolution.

Yeah that works sometimes. However I need to click *before* it has buffered that far in at 480p, meaning I have to skip part of the video. Refreshing the page (which triggers another ad) sometimes works.. But it shouldn't have to be like that. It would be as if the passenger door on your car wouldn't open unless you open the trunk and turn on the windshield wipers first..

I have a problem with something, I have done absolutely nothing about this problem so it must be someone elses fault.

I shouldn't have to do anything. There's a play button which plays the video, and a Settings button that allows me to set the resolution. You would expect that selecting a different resolution would..I don't know..set a different resolution maybe?

It's likely not YouTube's fault - it's probably your ISP. Call them and threaten to cancel if your video experience online continues to be this poor.

Ars Technica - Why YouTube buffers: The secret deals that make—and break—online video

HD actually plays fine now as long as I actually manage to get it selected. The buffering problems were the worst last winter/spring but improved after that. The problem now is that you have to go through hoops to even get HD selected.

 

[Sonikku]

Sometimes HD works, but with some videos when I hit 1080p the video doesn't "change gears". I never knew why.

 

[AnonymouseUser]

Go to http://youtube.com/html5 and click "Join the HTML5 trial" button. Whenever HTML5 is available, you'll get the HTML5 player instead of the Flash player. HTML5 videos will load and play instantly, without the buffering issues.

EDIT>> Here's an example: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_UQUbGwUFe0&html5=True

The link forces HTML5, but you'll still have to hit the settings button or go full screen to switch to 720p.

 

[Red Squirrel]

Youtube has been getting worse and worse, and has been since Google butchered bought it.

It's not like Google to try to make a product suck that bad. You would think it was actually being run by Microsoft. Then again all I hear is how the new gmail sucks, so guess Google is turning into Microsoft. "Let's change stuff for shits and giggles, and make it worse than what it was!"

 

[Red Squirrel]

Go to http://youtube.com/html5 and click "Join the HTML5 trial" button. Whenever HTML5 is available, you'll get the HTML5 player instead of the Flash player. HTML5 videos will load and play instantly, without the buffering issues.

EDIT>> Here's an example: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_UQUbGwUFe0&html5=True

The link forces HTML5, but you'll still have to hit the settings button or go full screen to switch to 720p.

What sucks is html5 does not work in Linux. I thought the whole point of html5 was cross platform and independent of any company's control (like flash being controlled by Adobe), but seems they blew it.

I occasionally get html5 videos and they never load.

 

[AnonymouseUser]

What sucks is html5 does not work in Linux. I thought the whole point of html5 was cross platform and independent of any company's control (like flash being controlled by Adobe), but seems they blew it.

I occasionally get html5 videos and they never load.

I don't know why you keep saying that, even after I showed you that HTML5 does work under Linux.

EDIT>> Here is the link I posted above working in an Xubuntu vm:

 

[Red Squirrel]

Requires tons of work around and crap though. I mean natively without having to do anything special. Just open firefox and go to the site. I should not need to completely change my browser just to view a video.

 

[AnonymouseUser]

Requires tons of work around and crap though. I mean natively without having to do anything special. Just open firefox and go to the site. I should not need to completely change my browser just to view a video.

I haven't added anything codec or browser related for Xubuntu or Mint LiveDVD (other thread). Something is broken on your install since it should be working by default.

 

[Jeff7]

20-25Mbps connection here, and I don't think I've ever had a 720p or 1080p video play without pausing to buffer every 5-10 seconds.
Even the 480p version has to pause every 20 seconds or so.

And now that Youtube clears its buffer every time you skip around in the video, it's even less usable.
DownloadHelper in Firefox is what I've used for a long time now - get the whole video, often in double the time it takes to play it, and then watch it freely on a player of my choice.

 

[Auric]

DownloadHelper in Firefox is what I've used for a long time now - get the whole video, often in double the time it takes to play it, and then watch it freely on a player of my choice.

...and with renderer and filters of choice, on the display of choice (sans browser complications). However, I stick with 480 since the higher options suffer atrocious bitrate density (i.e. FauxHD). Also, OGG/WEBM is crap compared to AVC/MP4.

 

[skipsneeky2]

Get buffering so damn often on youtube,i often run 360p and as awful as it looks at least the damn videos load.

Half the time i get buffering cause my dsl company is relentlessly just pure crap and the worst ever conceived then the other half cause of youtube,i make 360p default no matter the time to save myself the hassle of the waiting game with youtube.

 

[zerocool84]

I've never had problems with YouTube at all with any HD playback.

 

[88keys]

I've never had problems with YouTube at all with any HD playback.

yeah, I think some people have slow internetz

 

[xBiffx]

yeah, I think some people are slow

Fixed.

 

[BUTCH1]

It's likely not YouTube's fault - it's probably your ISP. Call them and threaten to cancel if your video experience online continues to be this poor.

Ars Technica - Why YouTube buffers: The secret deals that make—and break—online video

I've read that the last time you posted it, everyone should read it to learn the truth as to why online streaming of YT Netflix, ect sucks a lot of the time, the ISP's will just probably tell you "hey, it's YT's fault if their servers can't keep up, not ours", read this article to see how wrong this can be and who's lying out their ass..