Question about video files

[MaxxFusion]

I have been using CPG for a while now and it works great for pics.  I want to start uploading videos for other to watch online. I am just taking simple video with my digital camera.  They are short clips typically but can get large quick.  I have one video that is 60mb and thats just too big to stream.  I uploaded it but it seems that when someone tries to view it the entire video gets downloaded in the background. At this time there is no indication so most likely the user will leave thinking its not working.  Is there anyway to buffer this and/or resize the video during upload?

Do I have to do that before I upload the avi file?  If so what could I use?  Any suggestions?

Thanks,
Frank

[Joachim Müller]

For real streaming you'll need a webserver that supports that (extra cost, regular webhosting packages don't come with streaming support). Usually, you can circumvent this by converting your videos on your client into a format that reduces file size and has streaming capabilities built into it. You have to understand that "avi" is not an actual file format, but a container file extension - there are thousands of codecs that all are labelled "avi". You best bet is to get the free Windows Media Encoder and convert your videos on your client before uploading them. When using re-encoding settings that make sense, you will get much smaller files as a result.
Another option is to use the "download video" plugin/mods (search the board for them) that will allow your users to download the videos and watch them on their clients (i.e. not embedded into the website), which will give them a progress bar during the download stage.