EDGE quality youtube over 3G?

[DJ88]

So today I went to an ATT store today to play with the new iPhone. It was connected to a 3G network so I loaded up a video on youtube and was pretty dissapointed to see it was still in crappy EDGE quality.

That sure sucks, I figured that with 3G now, downloading the wi-fi high quality videos would be no problem. Is there some way to force the iphone into only loading the high quality version?

[MacGeek7]

It's not an Edge vs. 3G quality issue - it's just the quality of the video on the YouTube servers

[michaelmaxwell2]

Oh well...... it loads quicker than the edge Iphone so thats all that matters.

[xSeanZx]

It's not an Edge vs. 3G quality issue - it's just the quality of the video on the YouTube servers

Wrong. I did a test of this over 3G and then wifi earlier, and the wifi version of the same video is much, MUCH better. I am thinking they kept it at an edge quality to make the loading times over 3G for youtube even faster.

[Vizin]

It's not an Edge vs. 3G quality issue - it's just the quality of the video on the YouTube servers

Nope, he's right. YouTube has two versions of each video for the iPhone, one for wifi and one for edge. The Edge version is noticeably lower quality, even lower than YouTube's normal videos. For some reason it's downloading the lower quality videos on 3G.

Hopefully this is just an oversight, and will be changed.

[lukeman3000]

Nope, he's right. YouTube has two versions of each video for the iPhone, one for wifi and one for edge. The Edge version is noticeably lower quality, even lower than YouTube's normal videos. For some reason it's downloading the lower quality videos on 3G.

Hopefully this is just an oversight, and will be changed.

Um yeah.. I just noticed that last night, that is total bullcrap lol

[mkoesel]

Nope, he's right. YouTube has two versions of each video for the iPhone, one for wifi and one for edge. The Edge version is noticeably lower quality, even lower than YouTube's normal videos. For some reason it's downloading the lower quality videos on 3G.

Hopefully this is just an oversight, and will be changed.

Does anyone know hor YouTube selects the video? Does it go by your internet provider's host? Or does do some calculations of your connection speed? Or something else?

[lukeman3000]

Does anyone know hor YouTube selects the video? Does it go by your internet provider's host? Or does do some calculations of your connection speed? Or something else?

Furthermore, I tried simply browsing to youtube.com in safari, and it pointed me to the mobile version.. is there a way to bypass this?

[mkoesel]

Furthermore, I tried simply browsing to youtube.com in safari, and it pointed me to the mobile version.. is there a way to bypass this?

Interesting - I tried and got the same result.

That one would surely require you to hack your User Agent HTTP header, which would require a jailbroken phone. And even that might not do it if they check your ISP on top of that. Faking the ISP would require serious hacking - IP spoofing and the like. Another possibility would be a remote desktop situation where you use your iPhone to control a PC or Mac that itself attaches to YouTube. But there again you'd need a jailbroken phone unless Apple/Microsoft publish an iPhone ARD/Remote Desktop app (which would be a great idea for both, IMHO).

EDIT: I see there is a VNC client for iPhone now. But, my guess is that this solution will be slow/stuttery for YouTube and plus the quality over VNC might not be better than the low quality videos on YouTube anywa.

[TimothyB]

Anymore news on this.

I just witnessed the YouTube APP completely load a 5-minute after only playing 21 seconds. I think that compression for 3G is a little overkill.

And yes, Wifi has a noticeable jump in quality over the EDGE/3G quality. From crap to near perfect. Yes, there are some videos now-a-days that look razer sharp on the iPhone with little to almost no noticeable compression. I'd like that quality over 3G too.