How do I place a video on an ASP.NET page and make it so that it will load in a timely manner?

Question

I have an .avi video (500 MB-50 minutes) that I embedded using the following code in VB.NET:

<OBJECT width="360px" height="360px" CLASSID="CLSID:6BF52A52-394A-11d3-B153-00C04F79FAA6" VIEWASTEXT>
<PARAM name="autoStart" value="False">
<PARAM name="URL" value="Video\Wellness_1.wmv">
<PARAM name="enabled" value="True">
<PARAM name="balance" value="0">
<PARAM name="currentPosition" value="0">
<PARAM name="enableContextMenu" value="True">
<PARAM name="fullScreen" value="false">
<PARAM name="mute" value="False">
<PARAM name="playCount" value="1">
<PARAM name="rate" value="1">
<PARAM name="stretchToFit" value="False">
<PARAM name="uiMode" value="full">
</OBJECT>

Worked fine except that it took approx 5 minutes to load. Converted it to a wmv file (cutting it down to 300 MB) and it started playing instantly while it download. Unfortunately there are some computers that will not play it for some reason. It will load and the timer starts up as if the video is playing but there is just a black screen. I ran some tests and determined that it's not a browser issue.

How can I upload a video that instantly plays on all computers?

Answer 1

Obviously at least some part of the video needs to be buffered before it can be played, so it makes no sense to ask for "a video that instantly plays on all computers".

Unfortunately there are some computers that will not play it for some reason.

What are these "some computers"? They probably don't have a plug-in that is capable of playing WMV files. If you want to reach as wide an audience as possible, at the moment, Flash is your best bet. There are plenty of FLV converters available on the Internet that you can use to convert your AVI video into FLV.

HTML5 video is another option but not all browsers (specifically IE) support it yet.