Vid size and format recommendations for member's area
 

what are the standard recommendations for video size, format and type for member's downloads? Right now mine are only opening up as 'save as', before they used to open up in windows media when clicked..which is better?

Right now I'm offering 256k and 1024k windows media, and 512k real media. The file sizes are kind of big, I'm trying to save a bit of cash on disk space, just got a nasty bill for $350+ for extra disk space from my hosting company. |cry| I deleted my highdef movies after that...stupid idea to put them up in the first place. |banghead|

Is quick time better? I'd love to know the industry standard and what is best for my customers. I haven't received any complaints about download time or size yet... the size of each is for a 5 min file: 256k=~10mb, 1024k=~40MB, rm 512=16mb. Also, am I offering *too* many options at my own expense?

we bumped our's up to roughly 5 minute clips @ 1500kbps.
Some members love them, but I've received a few emails from people having trouble, so I think we may have jumped the gun a bit. I'm starting to re-encode @ 768kbps for those people now.


btw- never skimp on the paying members, find ways to cut your expenses in regards to the freeloaders instead.

Thanks for the comment, I was starting to think no one had member's areas with video content in here! I think I'll stick to the format I'm doing then, 1024 looks very good to me, and 512 is a bit too low quality for good connections. I was just wondering if quicktime or real media was better in regards to file size or quality, but I think windows media is the standard for most?

In my experience, surfers hate both real & quicktime.
You might consider running off your clips for ipod too while you're at it.

Well I hate both real and quicktime, I shouldn't be surprised. But I wanted to offer an alterate option.

I just made my first ipod video clip, it was on my to-do list but thanks for the reminder. Hoping it works, I don't have an ipod to test it out on.