Why does YouTube on Firefox offer so few quality options even if the video can be viewed in higher quality on Chrome or when it is embeded?
I've noticed that YouTube only offers three quality options for some videos when viewed on the video's page (240p, 360p, and 720p) even while the offered video elsewhere is significantly higher. One example of this is the following video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DvY5irWC7kA (/u/aygoman of /r/Oman); when viewed in Chrome or when embedded in a page (such as through the RES addon), the video options are more verbose: 240p, 360p, 480p, 720p, 1080p, 2160p.
While I do not typically view above 720p, sometimes I would like the option to view a video in either 1080p or 480p and cannot for some unknown reason.
Chosen solution
Type about:config in address bar. It will give a warning,click on button that says "I'll be careful,I promise!". Paste this in search bar of about config.
media.mediasource.enabled
and double click on the entry showed to make it true and bold. Now html5 videos will show all resolutions. If this causes any problem,double click on the entry again to make it false. Make sure you are in html trial and flash is disabled on youtube.com
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Are you using the YouTube HTML5 media player or the Flash player?
See also:
hello, you can see this article for some background on that issue: http://www.ghacks.net/2013/10/27/youtube-videos-firefox-1080p/
Edit: I noticed after another load on my desktop that I was once again limited to the previous options. I realized that one of my addons, SmartVideo For YouTube 0.979, was limiting my options. Initially I was unable to remove it, but after removing a few files (addons.sqlite, addons.json, pluginreg.dat, extensions.ini, extensions.json, extensions.sqlite, and extensions.log), I was able to do so. After this, I was able to view videos with all of the resolutions options intact. Removing it on my laptop furnished me with similar results.
In short, SmartVideo For YouTube 0.979 (updated 01/29/14) was creating issues.
Original: I was using the Flash player on both my desktop (Windows 7) and my laptop (OSX 10.9.2); I found there was an update for Firefox from 29.0.1 to 30.0 so I completed it. After doing so, I did not appear to gain any quality options on my laptop, though on my desktop it appears that I now have access to all of the resolutions. Switching to the HTML5 viewer limited my streaming options to 360p on my laptop, and to 360p/720p on my desktop. It's worth noting, however, that the OSX binary does not appear to support H.264.
I'm still wondering why I can view all of the quality options on my laptop if the video is embedded, but I'm still limited to the aforementioned resolutions. I've attached screenshots showing the options present.
Modified by amberkilloran
Seçilmiş Həll
Type about:config in address bar. It will give a warning,click on button that says "I'll be careful,I promise!". Paste this in search bar of about config.
media.mediasource.enabled
and double click on the entry showed to make it true and bold. Now html5 videos will show all resolutions. If this causes any problem,double click on the entry again to make it false. Make sure you are in html trial and flash is disabled on youtube.com
Modified by Gaggi