Can a bad quality video damage my phone?

venom0706

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Aug 18, 2012
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I know my question might sound stupid, but I have a bad quality video clip on my phone (with a very grainy and "wavy" video quality). I was wondering, while watching this video, are the phone processor and RAM taking a heavier overload than when watching a normal video (with good video quality) and can my phone be damaged or everything is fine?

Thank you and appreciated.
 
Solution
It should be fine. From the phone's point of view, there shouldn't be a difference with how video is handled; regardless of the quality of the video. The factors that would determine cpu/ram load would be encoding rate and decoder. Some of the high quality file formats have a higher load than others (mkv,mp4 over mp2), but any somewhat modern hardware should be able to handle it just fine. Encoding rate would be the bigger factor at that point; where higher= more load.
It should be fine. From the phone's point of view, there shouldn't be a difference with how video is handled; regardless of the quality of the video. The factors that would determine cpu/ram load would be encoding rate and decoder. Some of the high quality file formats have a higher load than others (mkv,mp4 over mp2), but any somewhat modern hardware should be able to handle it just fine. Encoding rate would be the bigger factor at that point; where higher= more load.
 
Solution


It has no affect on the phone, nor does a bad quality video require more processing power.

Even if it did, there is no chance in the world of it breaking anything.
 


Nope, it won't hurt it at all. The worst you'll see with the higher encoding is that the video will get choppy or the audio will skip. Even then, it won't hurt the phone.

The only time I've seen videos cause issues on a computer was with .wma files encoded with virus in them back in Win98/XP days. And even then, the affect was only with Windows Media Player.
 
Thanks! One more question. With the higher encoding, if the video gets choppy or the audio skips, do you mean they will skip at the same point every time the video is played, or they will begin skipping more and more (in different parts) with every video play, thus damaging the whole clip in time? I mean, does playing the video affect it in any way and change it somehow or it will stay the same no matter how many times it is played? Thank you.
 


Video files do not deteriorate over time. You can play it 10 million times its going to be the same each time.
 


Exactly, The skipping would be caused from the device struggling to keep up. Think of it like a video game where the fps keep dropping at random points due to a weaker CPU. The video file (or game files in the example) isn't altered in any way from it.
 
Thank you! And what about the grainy video? I am talking about a very bad quality where the actual video is fluctuating and appears like constantly moving waves at the background. It shouldn't affect the device that it is being played on, right?
 


As mentioned. There is no way in the world a video of any poor quality in any possible way can damage your device.
 
I mean, I can play it constantly and the video won't be affected or altered in any way (even with the wavy video quality)?

It just seems that with an unstable video quality, the whole clip might get altered or worsened.
 


Its is a digital file, its completely impossible for it to degrade or damage anything.

Degradation like that happens to video tapes, thats about it.
 


No. And screen burn is not common on AMOLED phones. Screen burn happens when the same static image is shown for very very long periods of time on a screen. Then that image's "ghost" burns in. Watch a commercial on a TV in a sports bar, the ESPN logo thats stuck on the screen is screen burn.