VDownloader falls into the desktop application category. The free version of the program, there is a paid version as well, offers video searching, playing, downloading and converting.

The application is pretty easy to use. A click on Search in the left sidebar opens all video search options. It is possible to search Youtube, Dailymotion, Yahoo Video and Google by keyword, playlist or username, and some for personal videos.

Those portals are the only video sites supported by the search. The application itself supports way more than that. Several other video portals can be browsed via the Web button that is also available in the sidebar, and clipboard monitoring ensures that users who prefer to use their web browser can make use of the downloader as well. Back to video search.

VDownloader searches all sites at once, the down arrow next to the search button can be clicked on to only search one of the available video hosting sites.

Videos that have been found by the search are shown with thumbnails, a small site icon that indicates where they are hosted, their name, a few words of their description and Download and Play now buttons.

A click on Play now opens a small window in which the video can be played directly. The standard site controls, like pausing, skipping ahead or muting are available. It is likely that the application uses Internet Explorer’s rendering engine for that, which means that it will work if IE can play videos.

A click on the download button opens a save as window which is used to select a download directory for the video. The software can convert videos automatically with avi being selected by default. Other formats include mp3, 3gp, device specific formats for Apple’s iPad or iPhone, and resolution specific formats.

All videos that are selected for download are added to the download queue which is accessible via the Activity sidebar button.

All downloads are listed with their title, originating video site, download status, total size, and a progress bar. Two videos are downloaded consecutively by default, which can be changed in the options.

The settings of the video downloader contain some interesting options. The program monitors the Windows clipboard for video urls which are automatically pasted in the download form of the activity monitor. That makes it a little bit easier to download videos from external sources, especially since there is an option to automatically download those videos (needs to be activated).

Another interesting option is the ability to integrate Youtube, Facebook and Megavideo accounts which makes the videos of the account searchable and downloadable.

The Web button opens a basic web browser to browse supported video portals. Available are about 25 different video portals that can be browsed directly.

It is necessary to be on the video page to download the video which does not have to be playing. Several options of the video downloader are only active in the commercial version, which includes access to a video history, scheduler, batch downloading videos, download of full HD videos or local video conversion.

The free version of VDownloader is available for download at the developer website. It tries to install the Ask Toolbar during installation which means that users need to pay attention to the installation to avoid this if they do not want the toolbar on their system. Compatibility information are not provided on the developer homepage, the software worked fine under Windows 7 Professional 64-bit.

Vdownloader is a little freeware program that scans your clipboard for links to youtube, google video, grinvi and dailymotion. Once it detects such a link the movie will be automatically downloaded and converted to the format that you specified in the settings. You may save the video as avi, mpg or psp and change the output size and audio bitrate in the process.

Converting youtube videos did not take long at all. A 2 minute video was downloaded and converted in about 2-3 minutes to mpg. I was trying the same on dailymotion and it was working fluent as well. It takes a little bit longer to convert larger videos of course but it still the fastest way that I know of. It is basically a one click download and conversion program.