I'm really sorry if something like this has already been done here, I haven't been on these forums a lot recently so I haven't browsing much... so yeah, I haven't seen anything like this before. Sorry if it has been done though.

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Well, I've recently discovered another magical reason why FireFox absolutely stomps Internet Explorer to the ground. With a plug-in created for FireFox browsers, you are able to rip and to view video files from sites such as youtube. What does this mean for you? It means you can give those guys in the request thread a break now and then by getting the videos from youtube yourself.

I'll try to simplify this down as far as possible. With a decent connection, this whole process really shouldn't take longer than a few minutes to get set up, plus a little more time per video. It's not that bad, really.

1. Get FireFox if you haven't already. Seriously, it rapes whatever you're using now. It's great. http://www.mozilla.com/en-US/firefox/

2. https://addons.mozilla.org/firefox/2390/ <-- Head over that way and download the plugin. Install, close, re-open firefox. Time to head to youtube (or whatever).

3. Now there should be a little icon down in the bottom-right of your firefox window. That's the video plugin. Once you're at the desired video page, click on that little icon. Click the button to download the video and give it a little response time. It might not work soon, just give it a minute. When prompted, save the file. If you're lucky it will allow you to save it as an AVI. For me, it didn't work. If it doesn't save with an extension, rename the file to have a .FLV extension!

4. If everything worked fine, which I doubt (I think youtube basically "fixed" their site to prevent direct ripping), go ahead and stop. Otherwise, you gotta do something with that file. So head on over to http://www.download.com/Riva-FLV-Encoder/3...&tag=button and download Riva VX. It'll convert that file for you. I hate www.download.com so if you can get a better link, please share.

5A. Riva VX comes with an FLV player. That means you don't really need to convert the file if you just want it for personal use. You can simply open your FLV file with the FLV player. If you want it in a normal format, though, continue on. If not, you're done. Yay!

5B. Install and then open Riva. It's pretty self-explanitory. Open your file as the input file and make the output file end with whatever extension you want... most likely AVI (Note: To be updated in further versions! As of now, I can't get AVI to show video... only sound. MPG extension appears to work ace though!). Make sure you check the output location so you know where it's converting to.

At this point, I'm going to give you my personal configuration for the video output.
- 320x240 resolution (this is what youtube uses, so why over-do it and make it look crappy?)
- 128 audio bit rate (not bad but not totally size-consuming)
- 360 video bit rate (yaey?)
- 25 frame-rate (standard, really)

Slap that "Encode" button.

6. Wait. Yes, this takes a while. 'Sall good though, give it some time and "HOLY CRAP!" Yes, you have the file. Open it up in whatever you use. Personally, I use winamp, but most standard players should work just fine.

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Okay, that's my rough draft of this guide. I plan on updating this to make things more clear and with possibly better methods or something. I don't really know. Questions? Comments?

... And maybe it would be a good idea to sticky this, maybe not now, but when the guide is more in-depth and more complete than it currently is.

And no fucking stealing this, thanks. If you want to put this somewhere else just give me a PM asking.

cool

Wanna download Youtube vids? Just use this V Downloader Alpha (or Alfa, im not sure). It's perfect, you can download vids form YouTube and Google.

i didnt know bout that! Thanks very much, really!

You're welcome.. the only problem is that you have to pay for it after a free period =/

i didnt notice

oh well, ill just re install it if i need it another time i guess