flash (macromedia): I have a site which contains a flash video on each page. The video is central
to the whole concept of the site, so it's important to maintain its size and
clarity. My client insists the site (meaning the video) must be capable of
running on a dial-up connection. At the moment it stutters too badly on
dial-up. Is this something that is do-able whilst still maintaining reasonable
quality? Or perhaps it is accepted in the industry that such a site simply will
not work on dial-up?

The current flv's run at 8 fps with a 200kps data rate. Size 320x240 video,
not incuding controller. I could probably reduce it to 6fps (at 150kps data
rate) which would be a bit choppy and lower quality, but mostly it's talking
heads, so perhaps I can get away with it. Question is whether that would be
enough to make it workable on dial-up. Is there any other option? (I don't want
to reduce the size of 320x240)

The site address is http://www.designerperfect.com.

I would appreciate your input if you have any constructive comments on the
dial up question.

Thanks, Tam.

I wouldn't make my site based on the 56k user unless that is your target
audience, and if it is then kill the flv files. Not too many 56k users want to
sit for 5 minutes to see a crappy 30 second video (quality not content).

You should re-encode those videos to play at a better rate for broadband
users, and maybe add extra buttons for dial-up users. This way you have 2 flv's
of the same movie, encoded at different rates. If someone clicks on the 56k
version, they get the choppy low res junk file. Buffer it longer to make it
play smoother. If they click on the broadband video link they get the nice,
smooth, clean and clear video that doesn't distract from the design.

/my 2 cents

Nickels - what you're saying makes sense. What I'm going to do is to make a
parallel site in which all videos are the lower quality, and at the home page -
where there is no video yet - I'll give the option with link to go to the
"dial-up site", with a suitable explanation/warning that dial-up means lower
quality. One question - where/how do I increase the buffer?

Thanks, Tam

Are you using Flash 8? If so click on the FLVPlayback component and then open
the Component Inspector Window (Top menubar "Window"->"Component Inspector").
You can now change the movie attributes like buffer time, auto play, skin,
volume...).
This can also be accomplished using actionscript. Give the FLV component
inspector an instance name like vid and then use the following code on the
frame (not attached to the flv component) that the FLV component is on:

vid.bufferTime = 3 //buffer 3 seconds

That should do it.