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Wednesday, July 8, 2009

Hulu Video Downloader: Holy Hulu, Batman!


Hulu Video Downloader is literally the only (free) tool that I know of to download from Hulu. Hulu is different than other sites (like Youtube) in that its hosted material is usually much, much higher quality, and it hosts entire episodes of TV shows. Apparently, it's quite hard to download Hulu videos, because no other downloader that I know of to this day can do it.

But HVD can, and that's amazing. It's a standalone app that is only 4mb that does not need to be installed, meaning that it is portable. The interface is fairly straightforward: you paste a Hulu URL into the download field, set the destination folder, then click "Add" and it will add to the list of downloads.

There are a few major catches though...

-Filetype: Even though there's a drop down list for a filetype, the free version of HVD only supports FLV, AVI, and MPEG.

-Lack of HD: Even though Hulu's basic videos are far higher quality than other sites, it has even better still with "Hi-Res". HVD, however, does not let you download as HQ unless you use the paid version.

-"Wait, what?" errors: Even though you can apparently buy a supreme version of HVD, I would hope it's not filled with errors like HVD. Don't get me wrong, it downloads videos great, it's just that when you try to delete an entry from the download list, it won't always work.


I'm not going to sugarcoat it: Hulu Video Downloader is shareware. It's just on the line between being usable enough to be considered "good" shareware, and being restricted enough to be "bad" shareware. But the way I see it: (1) It Hulu videos just fine, and (2) there are limited alternatives. If there were other programs or browser extensions that quickly and FREELY let you download Hulu videos, I would probably throw HVD out the window. But until that day, it does what it does splendidly.....even if it's sharishware.

*Hulu icon made by jasonrayner of DeviantArt. Check it out!

4 comments:

  1. Hi! Are you still content with HVD? I was absolutely happy within few first DLs, it worked for me even with Hotspot Shield proxy program, but then - few days ago and all of sudden - it almost stopped to work. Only occasionaly, after many tries of adding and removing the link, I succeeded to get one file in a long time. I have asked the developer what´s wrong. I got an advice to DL the latest upgrade of HVD - and again: from the start it worked flawlessly but then it began to behave exactly as the former version what means that practically it stopped to work. Maybe we can share some opinions and maybe your wil help me to solve this problem - in case it is exclusively mine. Would you be so kind and reply eventually on my e-mail lipcik@yahoo.com as I am not sure I could keep a track of this site... Thanks a lot.

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  2. Feel free to just send me an e-mail next time. I'll see that alot quicker....maybe. =]

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  3. You may also try this method to download from Hulu, YouTube, Facebook, Vimeo, Spotify etc http://www.allavsoft.com/how-to/hulu-download-videos.html

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  4. Despite the fact that you can clearly purchase a preeminent variant of HVD, I would trust it's not loaded with blunders like HVD. Try not to misunderstand me, UK Essay Writing Service it downloads recordings incredible, it's recently that when you endeavor to erase a passage from the download show, it won't generally work.

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