Downloading mp3 from Youtube...

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1

I used to use Flash Video Downloader extension for Firefox to download as mp3 audio files from Youtube. I recently updated the extension, though it had been a while since I last used it. Now I notice that while there are options for downloading as video, there’s no longer any option to download as mp3.

So I tried some other Firefox extensions and even some online websites for the task. In general they did download the mp3 audio from the Youtube video, but with a quite lower default volume, or would it be quality? (I have to set speakers higher to listen the files).

  1. What happened to Flash Video Downloader mp3 option?

  2. For the other options, is it normal that files download with lower volume or is it Youtube’s doing?

Thanks beforehand.

2

as far as I know all youtube audio is aac stereo.
In Video Download helper you need to select “Download and Convert”
There are three .mp3 options there - mp3, mp3-192 & mp3-HQ

This is what I see in download helper 4.9.23

edit: sorry - just noticed it’s a different addon.
Anyway - video download helper will download and convert youtube aac audio to mp3 at one of the qualities I mentioned.

3

FYI - If you’re interested in an alternative,
I’ve been happy for quite awhile with JDownloader.
Is not a browser plugin, but a standalone app.

It’s a Java app, so is ridiculously big, but it works well.

It will generally auto recognize and import any valid URLs in Clipboard
It gives you the opportunity to inspect and select any/all of the individual streams (including MP3).
It will download at any rate you wish, can be paused and resumed.
You can queue multiple downloads.

Some might find the instructions I wrote how to install on LXDE useful for installing in other Desktops as well, in particular the command for invoking the app
http://en.opensuse.org/User:Tsu2/LXDE-Main_Menu

TSU

4

I personally use a program called Clipgrab ( http://clipgrab.de/ ) which can save as FLV, MP4, MP3 etc.

5

Another vote for Clipgrab here (from the packman repo)

6

Try
https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/video-downloader-professi/elicpjhcidhpjomhibiffojpinpmmpil

It is somewhat annoying at times, but works

7

Thanks all very much, but actually I’m not interested in alternatives. Well, actually I may give Video DownloadHelper a try, but I don’t like stand alone apps. I’d prefer add-ons or websites for these kind of things.

Besides, seems neither of my 2 original questions from the first post is still answered. Or is it that there’s actually no answer? (I’m sure Flash Video Downloader used to have the “download as mp3” option when downloading from Youtube…)

P.S.:Mr Caf, I actually don’t like Chrome, once it gave me few worse issues than Firefox itself. But thanks anyway.

8

this is the most likely place to get your questions answered . . .
http://www.flashvideodownloader.org/fvd-suite/page/contacts

9

Is also avail for ff

10

On 2014-09-03 17:16, tsu2 wrote:
>
> FYI - If you’re interested in an alternative,
> I’ve been happy for quite awhile with JDownloader.
> Is not a browser plugin, but a standalone app.

I know and use it, but… does it handle youtube? I had no idea.

–
Cheers / Saludos,

Carlos E. R.
(from 13.1 x86_64 “Bottle” at Telcontar)

11

On 2014-09-03 23:26, F style wrote:
>
> Thanks all very much, but actually I’m not interested in alternatives.
> Well, actually I may give Video DownloadHelper a try, but I don’t like
> stand alone apps. I’d prefer add-ons or websites for these kind of
> things.

Well, you see, these youtube downloaders what they do is offer you for
download the versions of the file that youtube itself offers. If youtube
does not offer mp3, you can’t download it.

Of course, you can download something else and then convert. It is
possible that a downloader does this automatically, though.

I asked once on the opensuse mail list about this.

I sometimes use a command line utility to do the download, like
“youtube-dl” or “cclive”, directly or combined with “trickle” to limit
the download speed. I can post more details if wanted.

–
Cheers / Saludos,

Carlos E. R.
(from 13.1 x86_64 “Bottle” at Telcontar)

12

Strange…

I should have mentioned in first post that the tests I did when downloading mp3 from Youtube were on another rig different than mine. On mine, I tried first Video DownloadHelper extension with the 3 qualities of mp3, and no volume loss. Then I tried again the same website I tested (www.youtube-mp3.org), and neither volume loss!

Of course there are several differences between both rigs; his being a bit older than mine, his is 13.1 32bit and mine 12.3 64bit, we both use AdBlock-Plus extension but he uses http on youtube, while I use https on it, he uses KDE and therefore Amarok, while I use GNOME and therefore Totem… We do have different versions of Firefox (mine is 29.0, he must have the latest one).

Do you think any of these differences could have to do with this strange issue?

P.S.: mr Caf, your extension only downloads video, not mp3, but thanks. At least I couldn’t find the option…

13

On 2014-09-04 17:06, F style wrote:

> Do you think any of these differences could have to do with this strange
> issue?

Yes. Perhaps. You are probably really downloading “DASH” format, and it
is being converted locally to mp3. The DASH protocol or format is
adaptative. If the system (server and client) decide that you can not
download at speed, it reduces the quality and size of the download, on
the fly. Conversely, it can be increased.

You must be aware if you are really downloading the format you want, or
you are doing a local conversion to a different target format. In the
second case, better switch to the “real” format, then do the conversion
yourself, offline, with options of your choice.

Which is why a pure downloader will not offer mp3 if it is not really
offered by youtube. Could you post a link to what you are trying to
download, so that others can try?

–
Cheers / Saludos,

Carlos E. R.
(from 13.1 x86_64 “Bottle” at Telcontar)

14

Well, actually should be any Youtube video in theory. Or will you say each Youtube video has different formats? Wouldn’t make sense, it should use same format for all videos…
I was trying at first with the Flash Video Downloader extension, but then I realized it no longer has a mp3 option. Then I tried with the mentioned website and few other Firefox extensions in the other rig, and I got volume loss. Then tried in mine with Video DownloadHelper and the mentioned website and I had no volume loss.

And, I know anything about that DASH format, not familiar for me…
Has Youtube always used .aac for audio, or there was a time when it used mp3? That would explain the disappearance of mp3 option in FVD extension…

15

On 2014-09-05 00:16, F style wrote:
>
> Well, actually should be any Youtube video in theory. Or will you say
> each Youtube video has different formats?

They do, actually.

> Wouldn’t make sense, it should
> use same format for all videos…

Well, for instance they can not offer a greater resolution than the original one has. Some have different language or subtitles available.

> I was trying at first with the Flash Video Downloader extension, but
> then I realized it no longer has a mp3 option. Then I tried with the
> mentioned website and few other Firefox extensions in the other rig, and
> I got volume loss. Then tried in mine with Video DownloadHelper and the
> mentioned website and I had no volume loss.
>
> And, I know anything about that DASH format, not familiar for me…
> Has Youtube always used .aac for audio, or there was a time when it used
> mp3? That would explain the disappearance of mp3 option in FVD
> extension…

Have a look here:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dynamic_Adaptive_Streaming_over_HTTP

Now, some examples.

This a bad quality video:


cer@Telcontar:~/tmp/youtubetest> youtube-dl -F "https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r-B2TH1h_rE"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v= Setting language
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v= r-B2TH1h_rE: Downloading webpage
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v= r-B2TH1h_rE: Downloading video info webpage
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r-B2TH1h_rE"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v= Setting language
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v= r-B2TH1h_rE: Downloading webpage
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v= r-B2TH1h_rE: Downloading video info webpage
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v= r-B2TH1h_rE: Extracting video information
WARNING: video doesn't have subtitles
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v= r-B2TH1h_rE: Looking for automatic captions
WARNING: Couldn't find automatic captions for r-B2TH1h_rE
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v= r-B2TH1h_rE: Available subtitles for video:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r-B2TH1h_rE"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v= Setting language
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v= r-B2TH1h_rE: Downloading webpage
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v= r-B2TH1h_rE: Downloading video info webpage
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-L5Xlgc8S2Q"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v= Setting language
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v= -L5Xlgc8S2Q: Downloading webpage
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v= -L5Xlgc8S2Q: Downloading video info webpage
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-L5Xlgc8S2Q"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v= Setting language
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v= -L5Xlgc8S2Q: Downloading webpage
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v= -L5Xlgc8S2Q: Downloading video info webpage
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v= -L5Xlgc8S2Q: Extracting video information
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v= -L5Xlgc8S2Q: Looking for automatic captions
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v= -L5Xlgc8S2Q: Downloading XML
WARNING: Video doesn't have automatic captions
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v= -L5Xlgc8S2Q: Available subtitles for video: el,fr,en,es
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v= -L5Xlgc8S2Q: Available automatic captions for video:
cer@Telcontar:~/tmp/youtubetest>

This “youtube-dl” does no format conversion.

As you see, the video does matter. So, now, if you post links to the audio tracks you have problems with, I can try and see what I can get.

–
Cheers / Saludos,

Carlos E. R.
(from 13.1 x86_64 “Bottle” at Telcontar)

16

Ok.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mB4HfaI-4U4

17

On 2014-09-05 01:56, F style wrote:
>
> Ok.
> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mB4HfaI-4U4

Ok, lets try.


cer@Telcontar:~/tmp/youtubetest> youtube-dl -F "https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mB4HfaI-4U4"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v= Setting language
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v= mB4HfaI-4U4: Downloading webpage
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v= mB4HfaI-4U4: Downloading video info webpage
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mB4HfaI-4U4"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v= Setting language
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v= mB4HfaI-4U4: Downloading webpage
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v= mB4HfaI-4U4: Downloading video info webpage
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v= 100% of 8.70MiB in 01:45
cer@Telcontar:~/tmp/youtubetest>

It is indeed audio:


cer@Telcontar:~/tmp/youtubetest> mediainfo blacksheep806-blacksheep806-Broken\ Wings\ -\ Beautiful\ Piano\ Music-mB4HfaI-4U4.m4a
General
Complete name                            : blacksheep806-blacksheep806-Broken Wings - Beautiful Piano Music-mB4HfaI-4U4.m4a
Format                                   : dash
Codec ID                                 : dash
File size                                : 8.70 MiB
Duration                                 : 9mn 28s
Overall bit rate                         : 128 Kbps
Encoded date                             : UTC 2014-08-07 11:25:14
Tagged date                              : UTC 2014-08-07 11:25:14

Audio
ID                                       : 1
Format                                   : AAC
Format/Info                              : Advanced Audio Codec
Format profile                           : LC
Codec ID                                 : 40
Duration                                 : 9mn 28s
Bit rate                                 : 126 Kbps
Channel(s)                               : 2 channels
Channel positions                        : Front: L R
Sampling rate                            : 44.1 KHz
Compression mode                         : Lossy
Stream size                              : 8.51 MiB (98%)
Encoded date                             : UTC 2014-08-07 11:25:14
Tagged date                              : UTC 2014-08-07 11:25:14


cer@Telcontar:~/tmp/youtubetest>

And it is about half the size than the mp4.
Audacious can not play it (it is DASH).
Amarok can.

–
Cheers / Saludos,

Carlos E. R.
(from 13.1 x86_64 “Bottle” at Telcontar)

18

I see, there’s no mp3 in the videos.
So, after downloading both the video and the m4a extract, as you did, did you notice any indication of quality loss by chance? Namely, low quality or volume loss in both files’ audio… Remember I got lower volume when downloading on the other rig, but didn’t when doing with my rig…
Is it m4a, dash, or aac? I got confused…

Also, tried looking if I had “man” pages for youtube-dl, cclive, or mediainfo. Nothing. Guess I’d have to install them…
Talking about it, how are these tools? What could you say about them? Got a bit curious…

Thanks.

19

im love this abdon :wink:
https://addons.mozilla.org/ar/firefox/addon/easy-youtube-video-download/

20

On 2014-09-05 03:46, F style wrote:
>
> I see, there’s no mp3 in the videos.
> So, after downloading both the video and the m4a extract, as you did,
> did you notice any indication of quality loss by chance? Namely, low
> quality or volume loss in both files’ audio… Remember I got lower
> volume when downloading on the other rig, but didn’t when doing with my
> rig…

No, I did not.

Unfortunately, my current loudspeakers appear to have sand inside, so
that they produce a gritting sound that makes listening to soft
classical music a sore pain. Something must have become loose inside,
needs cleaning perhaps, but these modern things can not be disassembled,
no screws… :-/

> Is it m4a, dash, or aac? I got confused…

Me too :slight_smile:

All of it, actually.

Ok, the file extension is “.m4a”. It is classified by youtube as “DASH
audio, audio@128k”, which is a dynamic protocol, as I mentioned (read
the wikipedia link I posted, it explains it). And the “mediainfo”
program said that it was encoded as “aac”, aka “Advanced Audio Codec”.
I’m not familiar with it.

You could say that it is an m4a container with an aac stream. m4a seems
to be another name for mpeg4, maybe used to indicate “audio only”.

Mmm… the wikipedia seems to confirm some of it:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MPEG-4_Part_14

It could be worse… “.m4p” has drm.

…m4b indicates audio book…

…m4r is used by the iphone for ring tones…

There are a few variants! :slight_smile:

LOL. The wikipedia says that they use different names despite all being
the same thing because Windows needs different extensions to know what
to use to handle them - the format is itself a container that can
actually be many different things, or contain several things (like
video, audio, subtittles…)

> Also, tried looking if I had “man” pages for youtube-dl, cclive, or
> mediainfo. Nothing. Guess I’d have to install them…

Of course ;.)

I think I got them from packman.

> Talking about it, how are these tools? What could you say about them?
> Got a bit curious…

Well, basically they are the same thing as the “flash video downloader”
plugin in Firefox, only that CLI, that is, a command you type on the
terminal. If the plugin works for you, use it, it is easier. The “flash
video downloader” does about the same thing with clicks, and it gives
you the same download types.

I use the CLI things because I want to reduce the download speed. My
router behaves badly if my internet pipe is used by one of these
downloads, and anything else in the entire house starts failing:
actually, it is DNS which fails, which makes everything else fail as a
consequence (ie, sites not found for email, whatsup in the phone, etc).
As my ADSL is just 1 Mbit/s, any video download can take long. Hours if
I queue a few.

And the plugin does not have an option to limit the download speed. Or
actually, FF does not have it. So I had to seek for alternatives…

–
Cheers / Saludos,

Carlos E. R.
(from 13.1 x86_64 “Bottle” at Telcontar)