How to fix the video lag in Firefox!
Lately my video (HD) playbacks in YouTube seemed to be lagging a LOT! I wondered why. I thought it would be me and my years old OS or perhaps even somehow my pc.
But no it wasn't. The lag was caused by Firefox's session saving feature. A simple and fast change in it and "poof" went the lag.
- Open Firefox and type in "about:config" (without the ") in the Address Bar and hit Enter.
- Type in "session" in the "Filter" line at the top of the list.
- Find “browser.sessionstore.interval” and double click it. The 10000 milliseconds (equals 10 seconds) is the interval in which Firefox keeps saving your session in case of a crash; same amount of time between video lags.
- Change it to something different. 120000 equals 2 minutes, 300000 equals 5 minutes or something else you desire. I went with 600000 (10 minutes), because I don’t particularly care about session saving.
Using Firefox 3.x? Speed it up by vacuuming its SQLite database!
Recently I stumbled onto some tips how to speed up ones Firefox. Firefox, since the version 3, uses a SQLite database for various tasks such as storing bookmarks, histories, site specific preferences and backups.
Over time it's get filled up with unnecessary and old info if you want, and there's a simple method to ditch those useless info and speed up your Firefox considerably, or like most of the guides say to "vacuum" it.
Use it once in a while, I've seen an improvement on my Firefox since I used it.
- Go to "Tools" -> "Error Console"
- Paste this in the "Code" text box:
Components.classes["@mozilla.org/browser/nav-history-service;1"].getService(Components.interfaces.nsPIPlacesDatabase).DBConnection.executeSimpleSQL("VACUUM"); - Press enter or click "evaluate"
- Your Firefox will freeze for a short time, just wait
- Enjoy your speed up Firefox!
How to share your email publicly and avoiding spam bots!
An interesting site I thought I'd mention it. We all know the dangers of publicly displaying our email address. Spam Bots! Once they have it you are pretty much doomed, except if you know how to set up your email-box against spam.
Anyway while surfing yesterday I stumbled on http://scr.im . A service which allows you to hide your email address until the person who wants to know it personally verifies a given code. This way Spam Bots are closed out!
All you have to do is enter your email address and choose your own URL like http://scr.im/WHATEVER ! Then share it. The person who clicks http://scr.im/WHATEVER will get a code and has to match from 8 random, and 1 exact match given.
http://mailhide.recaptcha.net is a similar service, expect you have to manually enter a given captcha.
Now we can carry on debating whether such services are useful or not. I say to each his/her own! No more stupid nocando(at)whateverservice dot com !
VirtualDub 720p HD settings for YouTube! [Good quality, small file size]
I often record gameplay clips from video games I'm playing with FRAPS. Usually in 1920x1080 resolution depending on the game and the FPS I get with FRAPS running. For transcoding the raw footage to something bearable to upload I usually use only VirtualDub.
Lately I've experimented with settings, and I think I found some good ones. Good video and sound quality with small file size were my goals. I think roughly 100 mb for a 5 min. clip and about 300mb for the full 10 min. in full 720p HD quality is awesome.
I'm still experimenting with sound compression but I think with 192 kb/s AC-3 ACM I have a good start.
Please bear in mind that the higher your resolution is the bigger your file size will be and vice versa. Those 100 mb respectively 300 mb are based on my 1920x1080 resolution!
This guide is intended for 16:10 and 16:9 resolutions. If you're playing on a 4:3 resolution, do not resize down to 1280*720p without maintaining aspect ratio, because the end-result will otherwise look over-stretched/-squeezed.
My settings for VirtualDub are in the picture below. If you want a very detailed explanation what each option does, check this out!
By the way, you have to have the H.264 codec installed to get it working. Download and install the latest VFW-version build here. PAY attention which version you're downloading, x86 (=32bit) or x86_64 (=64bit).
A warning about the Option "Multithreading" -> "Threads" don't set it higher than [# of your CPU Cores * 1.5] because then your whole system will start chugging. For example a Core 2 Duo would be 2 Cores * 1.5 = 3, a Q9550 would be 4 Cores * 1.5 = 6 and an AMD Phenom II X3 would be 3 Cores * 1.5 = 4.5 4.
This is by no means a guarantee that it will or will not work on your system. Each system, its components and its software are unique. You'll probably have to experiment a bit on your own. But those mentioned numbers are a good start.
It also might be necessary for you to adjust the audio volume to your liking. I have -10 dB, because the sound I record is terribad. My onboard sound sucks, period. Some people also experience asynchronous sound, here's how you can fix it.
On a side note: When you have uploaded your clip on YouTube and YouTube processed it the quality then will be lowered again. There's nothing you or I can do about that, it's up to YouTube.
The whole tutorial is also available on YouTube as a video:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o9XOgnaJ_Hs
A few links to my own HD clips:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nxijbXfIs4A&hd=1
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3yt35f2WFFY&hd=1
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Oe4jCQ8zzz0&hd=1
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eNLlobJbrm8&hd=1
Addendum 16.September 2009: Enabling GPU acceleration
Since version 1.9.4 it is possible to use the GPUs processing power (if your GPU supports it, which most modern GPUs do) as part of whole the transcoding process. This way you can speed up the transcoding process significantly (depending on your compression settings!).
On my computer this cut my transcoding time from an average 1h for a 10 min. clip down to some 40-ish minutes. Under "Options" -> "Preferences" enable "3D accel".
Addendum 23.10.2009: Crashes during encoding
There's currently a problem causing VirtualDub 1.9.4/5/6/7/8/9 to crash under Windows 7 while encoding sometimes. The culprit is 3D accel! Turn it off under "Preferences" -> "3D accel" and enjoy VirtualDub once again!
Addendum 16.05.2010: Option "3d accel" slowing down encoding
I've been getting mixed messages. Apparently using "3d accel" causes it to render slower than usual on some systems. I can confirm that. With 3d accel turned on, a 10min video takes about 1 hour 10-20 minutes, while turned off it takes about 1 hour max. You'll have to experiment on your system!
And if you are running on a multicore cpu, don't forget to enable threading via "Option" -> "Preferences" -> set "Threading" to 1!
Update 27.01.2011:
Updated Setting Screenshot
Want to support us?
--------------------------------------
--------------------------------------
Follow Us!
Recent Comments
- floopy on How to unassociate File Types in Windows 7!
- Don Salva on VirtualDub: How to use mkv, mp4, flv, mov and other file formats with VirtualDub
- Steve on VirtualDub: How to use mkv, mp4, flv, mov and other file formats with VirtualDub
- Angie on How to fix the video lag in Firefox!
- Claudette on How to unassociate File Types in Windows 7!
Recent tweets
- Video game worlds size comparison: http://t.co/oSaMwAsU #games #worlds #size
- 3 most useless things in the world: Nuns' nipples, bishops' balls and an employer's praise without a raise. #truestory
- History of #ART : http://t.co/wFgLomCr #funny #picture
- How much of x substance does one need to kill you? http://t.co/1bBqIRdX #infographic
- “Fast Food - Ads vs. Reality” — http://t.co/g2I8X1ve
Categories
Archives
Calendar
| M | T | W | T | F | S | S |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| « Feb | ||||||
| 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | |
| 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 |
| 14 | 15 | 16 | 17 | 18 | 19 | 20 |
| 21 | 22 | 23 | 24 | 25 | 26 | 27 |
| 28 | 29 | 30 | 31 | |||