iPad Best way to get videos on my iPad?

I'd recommend taking a look at GoodPlayer. it allows you to transfer movies via Wifi and you dont have the convert them as GoodPlayer will pretty play any movie format.

Zav said:

Recently bought an iPad 4th Gen and its an amazing product. I was always on the fence with iPads, but once i've owned one I now know what all the hype is about.

Anyway, I'd love a decent way to be able to transfer and playback movies on my iPad, HD or SD, I'm not too fused. I'm really not a fan of iTunes so I'd like to steer clear from that. I'm guessing its not as simple as dragging and dropping from my iMac like it is on my One X+. Maybe a 3rd party app or something? Wondering if anyone has a great solution out there?

Thanks.

Z.

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Personally, I don't bother putting much video on my iPad. I know you're not a fan of iTunes but it is the best way to manage your music etc but anyway, if you don't care to copy the files over from your PC, just run AirVideo Server on it and get the AirVideo app. I use this on my iPad and iPhone all the time and I can stream video files from my PC to my iOS devices without copying them over and it supports on the fly transcoding and compression so you can even watch them while you're away from home as long as you have a network connection. The other day I was at my in-laws and streaming films from my home system onto my iPhone for my son to watch (kept him quiet). I very rarely bother to put the videos on my iPad or iPhone as a result which is great since it saves me having large files sitting on them.

This is the best solution in my opinion.
http://howto.cnet.com/8301-11310_39-20043530-285/how-to-use-sd-cards-for-extra-ipad-video-storage/

There is no need for a wifi connection or access to your computer.All I need to do is leave 1 or 2G free on my ipad and I can watch all the movies I want on a long haul flight.Just delete a movie after you finish watching it and import another one from the camera connection kit.

I know you don't like it but iTunes is the best way.

It's exactly what it was designed to do.

If you chose to Manually manage your music and videos in iTunes, it's just a case of drag and drop.

Not sure why people seem to despise it as much as they do. It works.

Sure it's showing it's age and has become a bit bloated, but it still works great.

You can drag and drop, but you need iTunes to be your conduit. Once you select "Manually manage music and videos" on the iPad configuration screen in iTunes, you can drag and drop appropriately-formatted video onto the iPad icon in iTunes to load them. You can also drag-and-drop other formats into third-party apps. You don't have to love iTunes, but it's not all that terrible.

iTunes will let you move over all kinds of stuff but make sure you have a player that will work for it. If your videos are avi, mkv etc the built in player won't always work.

If you are using something else then you don't want to drag it into the normal movie collection. You'll need to install it into the app. You can do this one of a couple of ways.

1. If the app supports file sharing you'll see it under the app syncing list when the iPad is pulled in. Select the app and then hit 'add'. Find the file etc

2. Use something like Dropbox to upload and download the files. I find this way useful when I'm traveling and I have files I want access to but don't necessarily want on my iPad. Including yes sometimes movies I've ripped off my DVD collection. I did this recently with the big behind the scenes of the making of the Harry potter movies. I ripped the files and put half on my ipad and the other half in my drop box to download at the hotel before my return flight home

I use CinexPlayer and find it to work well. I don't use MKVs though, usually only AVIs. I find the controls so much better than the built in player and of course it's easier to load them onto your machine than using itunes in my opinion. The ridiculous checking method box in itunes is so archaic. Has that changed in the new itunes???

Oh and I feel that Cinexplayer isn't a battery hog. But that's just a gut feeling not tested.

use an video player app like avplayer hd or gplayer,.... and put all your videos in there using the official way "itunes file sharing" or other ways, ifunbox is easiest

HengenJL said:

I'd recommend taking a look at GoodPlayer. it allows you to transfer movies via Wifi and you dont have the convert them as GoodPlayer will pretty play any movie format.

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I would also recommend GoodPlayer as it is easy to add/delete videos and works well.

poloponies said:

You can drag and drop, but you need iTunes to be your conduit. Once you select "Manually manage music and videos" on the iPad configuration screen in iTunes, you can drag and drop appropriately-formatted video onto the iPad icon in iTunes to load them. You can also drag-and-drop other formats into third-party apps. You don't have to love iTunes, but it's not all that terrible.

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Yeah, you know, I can see people getting a little frazzled over syncing, but configure iTunes for manual management, and the workflow is almost no different vs. a device that mounts as a USB drive:

Connect device
Open device on computer
Drag files to device

I don't think people realize you can even drag media that's not in your library directly to a mounted device in iTunes (from your filesystem).

PLex is a good option.

I'm trying to buy all my stuff from iTunes at the moment so its all ready in the cloud should I need it on all my devices.

AVPlayer HD for the iPad, I think it's $1.99 but it works wonders. It has a nice and simple interface and you can add videos to it via iTunes under File Sharing.

It'll play virtually any file format and even do 1080p video on the new iPad I believe. GoodPlayer is good too, but I don't care much for the interface and it can be a tad buggy at times.

If you're planning to only watch video near your computer and on the same network as it, AirVideo works wonders as long as you have a decent Mac or Pc.

Plex Media

Look at the Plex Media.

It allows you to access your content ANY where...

Zav said:

This sounds decent, cheers!

Apart from this though, you all say iTunes is the best? The reason why I'm not that fond of it, is briefly mentioned in Hengen's post. It's the mass amounts of conversion you've got to do so that it recognises the video format. Unlike music files iTunes struggles with the mass amounts of video formats.

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Agreed, if you have no problem converting your video to MP4, then use iTunes.

If however, you dont see any logical reason to do so, and would like to play any video format on your iPad, then find a 3rd party app. I haven't used GoodPlayer, i use AVPlayerHD. It plays all formats so far.

I use iTunes to move media over though.

1) Connect the iPad to my PC,
2) Fire up iTunes and select the iPad
3) Select apps
4) Select the AVPlayerHD app,
5) Drag files over, from the explorer window and drop them down into the file area for AVPlayerHD
6) They are uploaded and are then associated with AVPlayerHD, and it can play them.

AVPlayerHD also allows you to organize, move around, delete when done, etc. Even password protect
the folder structure you create in AVPlayerHD.

So its either spend the time converting everything to MP4 because Apple wants you to, or dont, pay 1.99 (I think) use AVPlayerHD and just drag and drop.

I was originally converting, but I really wanted the ability to organize my videos on my iPad. Apple gives you nothing for that, so I went with AVPlayerHD.