YouTube videos cut short

[jollyjack]

When I start playing a YouTube video, all is well till I get to around 1m30secs, when the download stops. I can't get it to continue - if I restart it, the same thing happens.

My wife's PC, running W7, seems to be better - it works most of the time (but also stops dead occasionally, though not at the same point).

I'm wondering if it's some form of a temporary cap applied by my ISP, or simply the ADSL line running out of capacity (I live in rural France, at the end of a long, old copper telephone line)?

Any help will be appreciated

Thanks

[Teunis]

In case it's the line your computer would wait until YouTube had replenished the buffer and then continue to play.
Do check if your wife is watching a smaller version of the video, after all I assume you did the comparison on the same long line...

A local problem could be your Linux install is lacking space for the buffer, unlikely but...

[jollyjack]

In case it's the line your computer would wait until YouTube had replenished the buffer and then continue to play.
Do check if your wife is watching a smaller version of the video, after all I assume you did the comparison on the same long line...

A local problem could be your Linux install is lacking space for the buffer, unlikely but...

Hi, Teunis,

Yes, my wife shares the same line, and it was the same version, a few minutes apart.

Normally, as you say, the video merely pauses till YouTube replenishes, but recently, it's been freezing, as I described - no sign of any "catch-up" activity from YouTube.

??

Thanks

[67GTA]

Been having problems with Youtube for about a month. I can't prove it, but my gut tells me that most ISP's throttle Youtube because it consumes massive amounts of bandwidth.

[Teunis]

I'm on a no-throttling, no-messing ISP and YouTube works fine, both on 13.04 and 13.10.
According to Dutch law such shenanigans would be illegal anyway.

[vinnywright]

Humm youtube,thistube,thattube, all seam to play fine hear on 12.04,12.10 .....not in the 13.04 install enough to be sure ....but will see later tonight.

VINNY

[GreyGeek]

With your browser opened and playing a youtube video (and no other tabs or sites loaded), open a konsol and issue:
netstat -na
which, in the top half of the listing, will give you a list of IP addresses with ESTABLISHED connections. YouTube IP begins with 206.111 or 74.125
Mine starts with the latter. Those are the throttled ports.
There are two solutions to break the throttle but both essentially block one or both of those IP addresses, which forced YouTube to default to the unthrottled server.

1) Install "BlockSite" on FireFox (I don't use Chromium)
https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/fir...teplus/?src=ss

2) Add the following rule to your firewall, if you are running a firewall:
iptables -I FORWARD -s 192.168.0.0/24 -d 206.111.0.0/16 -j REJECT
iptables -D FORWARD -s 192.168.0.0/24 -d 206.111.0.0/16 -j REJECT

If you use DROP instead of REJECT you may get timeout problems.

Change your local subnet and the YouTube addresses to match your situation.

DISCLAIMER: I read this somewhere and took notes, but can't remember where. Also, my Youtube speed is very fast without either method, so I haven't tried them. But, those who have claim miracles!

[Robtygart]

I am having the exact same problem with my 12.04 computer, my 13.04 works.

I am using Firefox, what is eveyone else using, and are you having the same problem in other browsers?

[jollyjack]

With your browser opened and playing a youtube video (and no other tabs or sites loaded), open a konsol and issue:
netstat -na
which, in the top half of the listing, will give you a list of IP addresses with ESTABLISHED connections. YouTube IP begins with 206.111 or 74.125
Mine starts with the latter. Those are the throttled ports.

Just run the same video again, and there's a 74.125 in the listing.

YET, the video ran cleanly to the end - in fact, the buffer was running ahead, something it hasn't done for a while.

Given it's 10am here, and all the local kids are in school, maybe I've the ADSL line all to myself. At other times, I'll have to share it with them - maybe there's not enough capacity and it chokes?. If that's the case, it should be resolved next month - we're getting a fibre-optic connection in the village. Yippee!

In the meantime, I could add "Blocksite" to my browser (Chromium). I guess I just block those two IP addresses?

Cheers

[Robtygart]

With your browser opened and playing a youtube video (and no other tabs or sites loaded), open a konsol and issue:
netstat -na
which, in the top half of the listing, will give you a list of IP addresses with ESTABLISHED connections. YouTube IP begins with 206.111 or 74.125
Mine starts with the latter. Those are the throttled ports.
There are two solutions to break the throttle but both essentially block one or both of those IP addresses, which forced YouTube to default to the unthrottled server.

1) Install "BlockSite" on FireFox (I don't use Chromium)
https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/fir...teplus/?src=ss

2) Add the following rule to your firewall, if you are running a firewall:
iptables -I FORWARD -s 192.168.0.0/24 -d 206.111.0.0/16 -j REJECT
iptables -D FORWARD -s 192.168.0.0/24 -d 206.111.0.0/16 -j REJECT

If you use DROP instead of REJECT you may get timeout problems.

Change your local subnet and the YouTube addresses to match your situation.

DISCLAIMER: I read this somewhere and took notes, but can't remember where. Also, my Youtube speed is very fast without either method, so I haven't tried them. But, those who have claim miracles!

Using Block Site, I blocked every 74.125 on the list, and when I do new ones show up? What does the unthrottled IP addres look like?

[GreyGeek]

Do the new ones act like they are throttled?
Generally, using 74.125.0.0/16 blocks all of them in that range.
If the new IP appear to be throttled then block them as well.
When you get to a point that YouTube videos don't play then unblock the last set you blocked.

[Robtygart]

Hi again!

Has anyone found a way round this problem yet? I can't watch any youtube video on any computer in my house. I can watch videos from sites other then youtube....

Kubuntu 13.10

[Teunis]

I'm afraid your problem is with the ISP, not the computers.

There's a small possibility youtu.be would not be throttled, try...

Or type in one of these IP addresses, in case the throttling is done on DNS it might by-pass the block:

• 208.65.153.238
• 208.65.153.251
• 208.65.153.253
• 208.117.236.69

Again if the ISP is using their DNS to filter youtube you might try alternative DNS servers, check google for some.

[jpenguin]

Are you using html5 or flash? HTML5, right?

[Robtygart]

No flash! Is there a way to convert only youtube videos to HTML 5?