YouTube Mobile leverages Flash to impress

Published by Steve Litchfield at 10:34 UTC, March 16th 2009

YouTube has finally, finally, done something about their low-grade 176 by 144 pixel mobile video interface. For Flash Lite 3-compatible phones (which means most S60 phones made in the last couple of years, provided firmware is kept recent), videos are now served up from the mobile YouTube interface in Flash format. Once the video starts playing, you tap to bring it up full screen in Flash Lite's video player. Most significantly, the quality's miles better than the original QCIF version - 480 by 320 pixels for many videos. Screenshots and links below.

Go to m.youtube.com in S60 Web to try out YouTube Mobile.

Here are some screenshots of YouTube Mobile in action on the Nokia 5800, showing the new video quality.

YouTube Mobile with Flash!

Symbian France was the site that first noticed this, plus Symbian Guru have also added their comments.

Steve Litchfield

Categories: Miscellaneous
Platforms: General, S60 3rd Edition, S60 5th Edition

News Discussion

neilhoskins

Just tested it with "Simon's Cat", the funniest films on the interwebs. Looks good.

Ratkat

Doesn't seem to work with all Flash-Lite enabled phones though, Some phones are shown the old version with low quality realplayer link.

Nokia E71 and Nokia N95 - Both show new flash version

Nokia N96 and Nokia N82 - Both show old version

Its all done on the browser user agent, if you change the N96 or N82 user agent to N95 they will both show the new version.

slitchfield

Maybe the YouTube mobile team are still updating the user agents supported?

Ratkat

Quote:

Originally Posted by slitchfield

Maybe the YouTube mobile team are still updating the user agents supported?

Possibly, or maybe they have only added the most popular devices at the moment

Unregistered

It's good but without download it's just not useful to me. Alright for 5 minutes and then forget.

gemikon

no luck with n85... is there a way to make it work? to make google think i have a n95 somehow?

Unregistered

Ratkat: "Its all done on the browser user agent, if you change the N96 or N82 user agent to N95 they will both show the new version."

How do you do that?

Tzer2

Yay! Just tried it on my 5800, works brilliantly! The quality is much much better than it used to be. :-) Thank you Google!

The address youtube.com is enough to get to the mobile version, you don't need to put m in front of it. (You can also switch to the full desktop site if you prefer.)

Quote:

Alright for 5 minutes and then forget.

That's Youtube in a nutshell, isn't it? ;-)

mkr10001

hi, steve mate i beg to differ...

http://www.n95users.com/forum/lounge...utube-com.html

i was in fact the first person to notice this

i am mkr100001 in that forum (1 extra 0). may i take credit for the find instead?

the date says 19th feb if i'm not mistaken

fernando20

fonts look a liiiittle too small on the 5800, and zoom doesn't stick, apparently. Plus video names get cut off with ellipsis just after a few characters. I'd like to stick with regular youtube.com, but can't beat the speed in m.youtube.com it seems.

Tzer2

Fernando20, there's an option to go to the normal desktop Youtube on the mobile Youtube site.

Like you say though, the mobile site is a lot faster.

Natureboyzone

Hi.i am new to the forum.i use N76 and my network is mtn nigeria.how do i activate it for free browsing.i also heard about the data call pls send me the settings or link me up with someone who can help.thanks

slitchfield

@mkr: Point taken. 8-) Next time you find something really interesting though, drop one of us at AAS an email at the time!

Tzer2

Quote:

i use N76 and my network is mtn nigeria.how do i activate it for free browsing.i also heard about the data call pls send me the settings or link me up with someone who can help.thanks

Contact your network for instructions on how to access its services.

Williamoni

Fearful Symmetry? What's that all about? Come on Steve we know you love Physics but you aren't going to get anywhere writing songs like that.

You're over complicating things. Take a look at these lyrics:

She loves you yeah yeah yeah
She loves you yeah yeah yeah
She loves you yeah yeah yeah yeah

Nice and simple and gets the point over. And besides, what's fearful about symmetry in the first place?

UKJeeper

No upgrade for me unfortunately. The E90 still only gets the realplayer option. A couple of people have mentioned changing the user agent, i've done this on my N810 to help improve the MicroB browser, can anyone provide a walkthrough for doing it for the S60 browser?

Full thread: 16 Comments / Post New Comment

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