Why not to stream YouTube videos in HD
There are several reasons streaming HD quality videos on YouTube may not make sense. For instance, if you have a limited Internet plan, watching HD videos can siphon the bandwidth. HD videos — especially 720P, 1080P and other high quality videos — will not buffer faster unless you have a really good Internet speed.
Even monitors and smartphones with smaller resolutions should stay away from YouTube HD videos, as the difference — both in audio and video quality — while playing videos is hardly noticeable.
Videos on YouTube doesn’t work on HD sometimes, and if that’s the case with you, it’s time to switch to a lower resolution.
Sign in to disable HD YouTube videos
Whether your computer is on WiFi or your smartphone is on 3G connection, the default HD video option can be turned off by logging in to your YouTube account.
Step 1
Go to YouTube. Login with your Google account.
Step 2
Under Account Settings (on the left side), click on “Playback.”
Step 3
Check “I have a slow connection. Never play higher-quality video.” Hit the “Save” button.
Next time you are watching a video on YouTube, it will be in either 240P or 360P resolution.
Disabling YouTube HD videos without signing in
Here are a few ways to get rid of the HD option, if you don’t want to sign in to your Google account:
1. You can manually change a video’s quality by selecting the “Change quality” button visible on the right-bottom corner on every YouTube video.
2. “YousableYouTubeFix” is a free Greasemonkey script that resizes existing video, enables and disables HD videos and also changes the Flash Player quality to minimize CPU usage. Plus, you can also download videos in FLV and MP4 format.
The script is available for Firefox (requires Greasemonkey installed), Google Chrome, and Opera. Download YousableYouTubefix.
3. “YouTube Options” is yet another Google Chrome extension allowing users to set a fixed video quality. All the videos across YouTube will be streamed according to the video quality you have set. The addon also disables autoplay, hides playlist, etc.
