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Forum Discussion
Improving Dropbox video preview quality - thinking outside the box
The poor quality of the Dropbox transcoded preview has been discussed over the years, particularly between 2015-2017.
Over the last six years, internet speeds have changed remarkably and online streaming is now commonplace.
So our clients are unforgiving in their distaste for the Dropbox preview product.
Dropbox has made it plain, that as far as they are concerned the solution is just download. However many many clients want to be sure the product is right for them before they download.
Thinking outside the box, if we load two versions of each video, one optimised for preview, of smaller file size etc.(so clients can be sure its the product they want- but we can be certain that for instance, the preview won't be out of audio/vision sync) and the full res version for them to download.
Surely the Dropbox engineers who work on the auto transcoding know the optimum specs for the preview file?
Can that please be shared with your clients? ( after all we are supposedly on the same team)
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I just upgraded my account pro plus and it appears to me playback quality online seems low res.
The file dowloads full resolution and looks great but not during playback online thru dropbox. Is there a setting for this?
The video quality plays lower resolution thru dropbox too.
- Robert S.
Super User alumni
The web player delivers a transcoded, browser-
friendly fifteen minute preview.To view a video in its original full-length HD
glory, it's necessary do download and play
locally. Yes just found some other information and not too happy that you can't play full resolution thru Dropbox.
However my Vimeo account has no problem to view full resolution even while online. Dropbox should really consider a way to view
the view full res video files thru Dropbox. Kinda a buzz kill as I just upgraded for a year mainly for video purpose.- Robert S.
The bottom line is, Vimeo and Dropbox are not comparable services.
The former is a video streaming service, the latter a file synchronisation tool.
Best advice is to use the correct tool for the job.
You are correct However I have some clients that would preffer to use dropbox so I was trying to appease them.
I would rather have know this first, this just adds another step for my process.Why does Dropbox compress video files and how to you change this?
- Robert S.
Dropbox doesn't change your files in any way.
Robert, you're lying and you know it. Plenty of my uploaded photos get compressed and I can't figure out how to stop it from happening. Personal experience, Dropbox 3.8.6, Windows 10 Pro.
I have the same problem. I was thinking about upgrading but the poor quality playback of video files that are 1080p playing poorly through Dropbox makes me reconsider.
Will Dropbox be thinking of ways to allow high resolution streaming?
If your going to do something, might as well make sure its done well. Not much point having the ability to play videos if the quality is going to be poor.
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