Watch Higher Quality Youtube Videos

Although Now YouTube offers higher res videos as much as 480×360 (but these are not HD), but it’s an improvement from the traditional 320×240, but when you want to view the specific video, is there a link or button to view the new better resolution? well in some videos there is a link offering you to take to higher resolution, but most users miss this and end up watching the traditional 320×240 videos.

The Difference Between the Two Qualities

Here are screen screenshots from both the high quality and low quality versions of the Beastie Boys’ “Gratitude” video on YouTube. The difference is noticeable in several areas, mostly the shadows and highlights on the bassist’s hands and on the background behind him.



Here is a ways to watch and share these new Hi-Res videos without hassle.

Methods

Viewing

1. The URL Hack



Add &fmt=18 to the end of a normal YouTube URL. If there’s a high quality version available, this will cause it to load.

2. The Firefox Add-on.
The team over at Lifehacker makes the Better YouTube extension for Firefox and the latest version of the add-on includes the URL hacking technique above (as well as some other goodies, like the ability to stop movies from auto-playing).

3. The Easily Overlooked Obvious Method



If you’re logged in to YouTube anyway, just head over to your account settings page. Near the bottom you’ll find a “Video Quality” option. Click that link and you’ll land on a page where you can choose to always see the higher quality videos. Obviously, this requires you to login to YouTube, so if you don’t want to do that, just stick with one of the methods above.

Even at the higher quality, YouTube videos aren’t going to look good on an HDTV. But for smaller monitors and laptops, they may be good enough to at least watch in full screen mode without the video turning the chunky moving blocks of color.

Sharing

Just adding the fmt=18 bit to the URLs in a video’s regular embed code won’t work. You have to add a couple of small pieces elsewhere, too. Here are the changes to make:

Code:

<object width=”480” height=”397“><param name=”movie” value=”(VIDEO EMBED URL)&ap=%2526fmt%3D18“></param><param name=”wmode” value=”window“></param><embed src=”(VIDEO EMBED URL)&ap=%2526fmt%3D18” type=”application/x-shockwave-flash” wmode=”window” width=”480” height=”397“></embed></object>

One Final Note

If you’re ripping YouTube videos to your iPod, Zune or other handheld, always grab the higher-quality version. Even though those screens are tiny, they show a lot of detail, so the extra quality goes a long way.

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Source: DotNetWizzard