Hello F, have you tried using an add-on to save videos? Video DownloadHelper is just one of several add-ons available for Firefox that would let you do that.

Hi dynamite,

Thanks very much for your reply.

I have tried a few Firefox add-ons including Video DownloadHelper, UnPlug, and RealPlayer.

None are working for the videos I want to save.

The Video DownloadHelper icon is gray in color and not animated on the page of the videos I want. I right clicked on the icon, but there doesn't seem to be an option for downloading in this case. Video DownloadHelper seems to be relevant to only specific sites that it lists as "supported sites."

RealPlayer says something like "unable to download."

UnPlug finds no video.

Any other ideas out there?

Could you please give an example of a site from where your are trying to download videos?

Thanks, dynamite, for your reply.

The videos are on a university website. They are videos of lectures.

If there's other technical info that would be helpful to making suggestions, please let me know. I prefer not to discuss the school though.

You might want to check the format of these videos (flash etc) and then check the supported video types for each of the add-ons you are using.

Thanks.

Could you suggest how to determine the format? I think they are flash, but I can't remember how I came to that opinion.

In any case, the tools that I've tried don't recognize or say they cannot save the videos.

Well, the quickest way that i can think of is to right click on the video. The menu that pops up will give a clue on its format. For instance, if there is a menu item containing "Adobe", it will be Flash format; if a menu contains "Apple" or "Quicktime", its Quicktime format and so on... If you find that these video types are supported by the add-ons, I would advise you to get support from the respective add-on developer.

Thanks, dynamite.

Yes, that's how I had the idea that the videos are Flash.

I see that DownloadHelper only works with certain sites which it lists in the application.

I did send a message to the developer of UnPlug.

I don't think Real Player would be responsive.

If you have any idea about a more powerful video saver, would you please let me know?

Well, I personally use DownloadHelper and it suffices in pulling videos off the sites I visit. Of course, you can always search Mozilla for the most popular add-ons for this purpose. Good luck!