{rw_text}Giveaway of the day for November 14, 2009 is:

Save Tube Video

Version reviewed:

v1.0

System Requirements:

Windows 2000, XP, Vista

Software description as per GOTD:

Save Tube Video allows to download any online video right from the browser in few easy steps.
You just download an .exe file and run the installation process. After the installation has been completed, your browser’s tool bar would have two new buttons – ‘Save video’ and ‘Show status’.When you play any online video, you may save it in any location of your PC by clicking the ‘Save video’ button. After that the video in browser is being played as usual, and its ‘hard copy’ is being saved to the chosen folder. When you click on the ‘Show Status’ button you will see the current download status. You may pause or resume the download using the Command field of the download status window.

The software works well with Internet Explorer and Mozilla Firefox, it doesn’t slow the browser down.
Save Tube Video also allows you to download two or more videos at the same time which is very convenient.
The program is a must-have for anyone who likes watching videos and especially for those people who would like to watch them offline.

Ashraf’s note:

Save Tube Video actually has a freeware version of the software. The only difference between the freeware version and the paid version is the paid version has the ability to burn videos to CD/DVD.

Update: The registered/paid version can also save in AVI while the freeware version cannot.

————————-{/rw_text} –>

{rw_good}

• Pretty much point and click in terms of user friendliness.
• Built right into browser making it convenient to download videos at a click of a button.
• Can burn videos after they download.
• Gives popup notice when a “downloadable” video is detected.
• Can download videos as FLV or AVI.
• Users can download multiple videos at a time.

{/rw_good} –>

{rw_bad}

• Browser dependent – only works with Internet Explorer and Firefox.
• Need to keep the (annoying) toolbar – no way to isolate just the necessary buttons.
• Developer claims to be able to save as FLV and AVI yet there seems to be no any way to save as AVI.
• Developer is not very clear on what are all the supported video streaming websites.

{/rw_bad} –>

{rw_score}
{for=”Ease of Use” value=”10″}Point and click.
{/for}
{for=”Performance” value=”8″}The developer is not very clear on what video streaming websites are supported, but the ones that Save Tube Video works with, it works with well.
{/for}
{for=”Usefulness” value=”6″}Working only with Internet Explorer, and Firefox, and supporting a limited number of websites, I feel many people will find other video downloading tools that support a greater number of browsers and websites more useful.
{/for}
{for=”Arbitrary Equalizer” value=”6″}This category reflects an arbitrary number that does not specifically stand for anything. Rather this number is used to reflect my overall rating/verdict of the program in which I considered all the features and free alternatives.
{/for}
{/rw_score} –>

{rw_badb}During installation users will be prompted to do a “Full Installation” or “Custom Installation”:

If users select “Full Installation” Save Tube Video will try to make GoogleFeed the default search engine/homepage for Internet Explorer:

However, if users select “Custom Installation” they can tell Save Tube Video to not make GoogleFeed the default search engine/homepage for Internet Explorer:

{/rw_badb} –>

{rw_verdict}[tdown]
{/rw_verdict} –>

Save Tube Video is a (yet another) streaming video downloader. It works as a plugin/addon  and works only with Firefox and Internet Explorer.

After you install Save Tube Video, you should notice a new toolbar in Firefox and Internet Explorer:

Although I do find it very convenient and appreciate the fact that the download video button is built into the browser for users to use, I despise the fact that users are unable to get rid of the toolbar and keep just the “Save video”, “Show Status” and/or “Burn It” buttons. I don’t know about other people, but I like my browser viewing space, and I hate having extra toolbars installed. I would like the developer to make it so when users customize the toolbar area, they are able to drag + drop the buttons away from the toolbar and then turn off the toolbar just like I have done with LinkExtend (LinkExtend installs as a toolbar but users can drag + drop buttons away and turn the toolbar off – LinkExtend is the green circle you see in the Firefox screenshot). Of course this is applicable to Firefox only because I am pretty sure this type of customization is not available in Internet Explorer.

Anyway, when you view a webpage with a video that Save Tube Video can download, it will display a small popup message telling you that you can download a vidoe and the “Save video” button will start flashing red:

At this point if the user wants to download the video, he/she needs to hit the “Save video” button, select where on their computer they want to save their video, and let Save Tube Video do its thing:

Although the developer claims to be able to save videos as FLV and AVI, I have been unable to find out how to save videos as AVI. Though I did not expect it to solve the problem, I even tried to name the file .AVI but that does not work. Update: Nevermind… apparently the registered version has AVI support but not the freeware version. To download as AVI, just select it from the drop down menu of “Save as type”.

After users have hit “Save”, the video will start downloading. However there is no visual verification that the video has started downloading. If users want to know for sure if the video started and to monitor the status of the download by clicking on the “Show status” button:

As you can see from the screenshot, users can stop/resume downloads, and after the videos finish downloading users can play the video by hitting “Play” (the default video viewer will open the video). Additionally, “Open” will open the folder/location the video was saved in and “Delete” will remove the video from the list (it will not delete the actual video you downloaded).

Last but not least, users have the ability to burn the videos they downloaded onto a CD/DVD or Blue-Ray/HD-DVD; to do this users just need to click on the “Burn It” button:

From the looks of it, I believe the developer of Save Tube Video uses the StarBurn SDK for the “Burn It” feature.

Aside from what I already mentioned (about the toolbar), I have a couple of criticisms for this Save Tube Video. The main criticim being the fact that the developer does not clarify which video streaming websites that Save Tube Video supports. As per my tests I have found Save Tube Video works with

• Veoh;
• YouTube;
• Video.Google.com;

But does not work with

• Metacafe;
• DailyMotion;
• Blip.tv;
• Vids.MySpace.com;
• Video.Yahoo.com;
• Vimeo.

The other criticism is more of an annoyance than anything else. In Firefox, when Save Tube Video detects a video, the popup message is always cut off:

The same problem does not occur in Internet Explorer though:

This review was conducted on a laptop running Windows 7 Professional 32-bit. The specs of the laptop are as follows: 3GB of RAM, a Radeon HD 2600 512MB graphics card, and an Intel T8300 2.4GHz Core 2 Duo processor.

{rw_freea}

Download Helper

Download Helper is a Firefox addon that makes downloading and converting videos very, very easy.

{/rw_freea} –>

{rw_verdict2}While Save Tube Video does do as it claims, I give Save Tube Video a thumbs down for one simple reason: with so many video downloading tools out there, any tool that does not support (at least) all major video streaming websites is not worth the download. Plus I am not particularly thrilled by the toolbar. My recommendation for today depends on what you want. If you already have RealPlayer installed, use the RealPlayer plugin (enable it if you have it disabled). If you like the grab-video-from-cache approach, grab VideoCacheView. If you like how Save Tube Video works from within your browser and you use Firefox, grab Download Helper. Otherwise, TubeMaster++ is the way to go.
{/rw_verdict2} –>