Thursday, May 5, 2011

How to Record/Save/Capture Streaming Videos from the Internet with High Quality

Many websites like YouTube use a Flash Video format that enables highly-compressed streaming video to effectively play in most browsers. However, the inconvenience with this type of format is that you will not be able to download it by using your Save target option. If you're a regular YouTube viewer, you've probably experienced the frustration of trying to save your favorite videos. So, how to record/save/capture streaming videos from the internet with high quality? Generally speaking, there are three common ways available to record /save/capture streaming videos online to your computer.

1. Using download-helper websites

KeepVid and YouTube Downloader are download-helper websites that allow users to provide them with the video’s URL.

KeepVid is completely browser-based, so there's no software to download. After you've found a video you want to save, enter that video's URL at KeepVid, then select its originating site from a pop-up list. KeepVid works with a wide variety of video sites. You can reuse its sites list to discover new places to surf for videos.

YouTube Downloader is a simpler option that only works with YouTube. In this site, you enter the URL of the page with your chosen video and click "Get Download URL." You'll then create a URL for the video itself. Click that new link to download the video file. You shouldn't need to add a FLV suffix, but it's a possible fix if you have problems. Again, you'll either need to convert this file or download a FLV viewer to play it.

2. Capture the video using a Firefox extension

Mozilla Firefox is a web browser that allows you to grab online videos with its additional Video Downloader extension. Certainly, you should install Mozilla Firefox firstly. When Firefox's installation is complete, you can download the Video Downloader extension.

3. Save the video by using commercial softwares

There are lots of commercial screen recorder softwares are available online that require installation. They can be used to download the streaming videos to your computer. Some have the option to convert your FLV format files into AVI files. Like Camersoft Screen Recorder. It is a professional and powerful screen recording software to record full screen, any area of the desktop screen, your chat video and you can record all audio and mouse cursor's movement. And then, this screen capture can help you save your recorded videos as AVI files automatically. So, you can certainly record/save/capture high-quality streaming videos online to your computer with this screen recorder software. Even record movies from TV card or live streaming video, record DVD, RM, VCD, MPEG, or other video medias, and make slide-show training documents or video demos easily. Here are the example of recording a video from YouTube.

Through comparison of these three ways, the most effective and easy way to record/save/capture streaming videos from the internet with high quality is to choose recorder software obviously. And these commercial softwares will usually provide free trial version to see if it’s good for you. So, just try this easy way immediately after finding your favorite software.