Video and audio on separate MP4 files

[Prodigal]

Until maybe 2 or 3 months ago I was able to download fight videos from a couple of MMA sites without problem. Now, however, the videos always download without sound, no matter which resolution I chose. Today I discovered that the smallest MP4 file offered is actually the audio file (AAC). My workaround for today was to play the audio in VLC and the video in MPC simultaneously, tweaking the video with the faster/slower speed buttons until they were more or less in sync. Obviously this is not a great permanent solution. Is there a way to get VDH to download these videos with the sound? I was not able to find anything in the forum quite like this.

If VDH cannot do this, can anyone suggest a program -- preferably freeware -- that can easily stitch these two files together?

One of the sites where this occurs is http://fullmmavideos.com .

I might also mention that I tried copying the video link and opening it in a separate page, and then choose "Save Page As" in Firefox, but again, no sound.

Hope someone can help.

[mig]

The video http://fullmmavideos.com/jorge-linares-vs-luke-campbell-full-fight-replay/ appears to me as separated MP4 chunks. This means VDH fails to do its job. I added this URL as a test case for the upcoming VDH7, but i cannot promise it will work and i don't see any workaround for now. Sorry.

[Anne Corrêa-Guedes]

The same thing started to happen to me, perhaps since the module is qualified "obsolete". Does it mean we have to wait for an upgrade ?

[mig]

What is your browser language ? The original en-US text shows "legacy" which has been unfortunately translated to "obsolète" in French. That's not quite the same and led to confusion. The technology used in VDH6 remains valid until Firefox 57. We will release VDH7 using the new Firefox add-on API.

[Prodigal]

I was able to merge the video and audio MP4 files with FFMPEG, but it would be nice not to have to mess around with this -- I'm not really much of a command line guy. I always seem to get one character wrong and then it's back to the beginning with my four-finger pecking :) . Hope you will be able to come up with a fix for VDH7 and save me from the FFMPEG command line.

That aside, kudos to you all for all the things VDH does do right.

[mig]

We are definitely not seeing the same problem onhttp://fullmmavideos.com/jorge-linares-vs-luke-campbell-full-fight-replay/ as what i see on this page wouldn't be solved by using ffmpeg.

[Prodigal]

One of the videos I downloaded was http://fullmmavideos.com/yushin-okami-vs-ovince-saint-preux-full-fight-replay  . When I click on the video for it to begin playing, I get four mp4 selections in VDH (see attachment). I did not download the 20.9 MB file, but the 23.9 and 115.9 MB files are video files. The 8.9 MB MP4 file is audio. With FFMPEG I was able to combine the audio file with the 115 MB video file. Also, before clicking on the video, if I would hover over it, it would show a Vidme icon.

I also went back to try to get the audio file for a previous video file with no sound (http://fullmmavideos.com/luke-rockhold-vs-david-branch-full-fight-replay/). However this time, as the video was trying to load, I was getting a continuous list of 1 - 1.5 MB video chunks in VDH, and the video never started playing, even after several attempts. But http://fullmmavideos.com/mike-perry-vs-alex-reyes-full-fight-replay/ , from the same fight card, gave MP4 video selections, and I assume an MP4 audio file, just like the first video.

I checked out your test video and got probably what you did: a series of 4-5 MB video chunks. I did not let it run its course to see if it would aggregate the pieces or add sound.(limited 4G bandwidth).

So perhaps it would be helpful if you would also check out either http://fullmmavideos.com/yushin-okami-vs-ovince-saint-preux-full-fight-replay  or  http://fullmmavideos.com/mike-perry-vs-alex-reyes-full-fight-replay/  .

[Prodigal]

Another site that downloads without the audio is  http://www.allfreefightvideos.com/ .

[Prodigal]

And apparently allfreefightvideos.com uses the same sources, at least for some of the fights, as fullmmavideos.com. I was able to get the audio file for the Rockwell - Branch fight here and it fit perfectly the video file from fullmmavideos.com, even though they were named differently.

[mig]

All right, http://fullmmavideos.com/yushin-okami-vs-ovince-saint-preux-full-fight-replay/ shows the problem you are describing.
Streams are indeed downloaded separately as either audio or video and reassembled in the browser when playing.

This is very similar to what YouTube does with ADP videos. This is no standard way to stream media from a web page. We had to write a lot of code to feature VDH with the ability to aggregate the streams into an audio+video single final file, and we did so because YouTube is well ... YouTube. I hope you understand we cannot do so for much more specific video web sites like the ones you reported.

If this technical practice (simple url streaming of separate audio and video channels) becomes popular, we will develop an interface to allow the user to specify the streams separately so that the ffmpeg/libav converter/aggregator will be called transparently to generate the final file. But i hope you understand this is something we cannot do now given the few use cases (so far the 2 sites you kindly mentioned).

[tjr1965]

This is very much a, "legitimate" issue that needs addressed.

I was actually very happy to see that I was not the only one that, "recently" noticed that I was receiving two files, instead of the one single video file that I had been receiving as usual.

Would appreciate you guys taking this seriously, as you have a good product, and I would like to continue using it.

Below, are three links that do not download correctly at any resolution, for me, from YouTube.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R0ScMs6_I8s

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mG_J2ANUACw

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=viEK4GbywEM

These are just three links, perhaps none download anymore from YouTube, I'm not sure, as Ive pretty much given up after noticing the above links didn't work correctly.

Also attaching a screen capture of what I receive when I try to download the above linked videos.

Only two, "media" files. The one ending in, ".MP4" is only video, the, ".tmp" one is only audio.

My setup:

Windows 7 Ultimate SP1 x64
Firefox v55.0.3 (32-bit)
DownloadHelper v6.3.1

[Prodigal]

Thank you for your response and explanation. Given this, I can understand where it would be nearly an impossible effort to address and fix problems with individual sites. At least I have found my own workaround to the problem, despite the few extra steps needed to get the video working correctly.

Regarding tjr1965's problem, I tried the first video in his list (the other 2 were too big), choosing a smaller WEBM file, and, indeed, at first it looks like you are stuck with the 2 media files and VDH is frozen in the aggregating mode. However, I noticed that after a couple minutes a tiny speck of green appeared at the beginning of the progress bar, so I let it run. It progressed, but way, way too slowly. The first image shows the progress after perhaps half an hour. During this time the converter/aggregator was using 25% of my CPU (avconv.exe in Task manager). I decided at that point to abort, but a few minutes later I saw that avconv was still running. Going back to DVH the blue dot was back and the progress bar showed it was still active. I tried aborting again but with the same results. I now also had 2 error messages; each opened to the message in the 2nd attachment. I eventually had to shut it down through Task Manager. I figure it probably would have completed in 1.5 - 2 hours. I immediately tried another YouTube video and it downloaded quickly and without problem, though it did not appear to need aggregating. I also tried downloading the problematic video with my go-to downloader for YouTube -- I use VDH for almost everything else -- and it completed in a few seconds. Anyway, I hope this helps.