Maighstir: (You don't need Flash for YouTube.)
rtcvb32: I find VLC wants to run if flash isn't present, however it always goes for a bitrate that i can't sustain, or is heavily unoptimized when trying to play anything.
You have a browser plugin for VLC? You can turn that off unless you're still running Windows XP and Explorer 8, or frequently visit sites that try to use HTML5 video with formats your browser doesn't support, as all big-name browsers, and all other browsers that implement or fork their web engines rather than building their own from scratch, already have HTML5 video with MP4/H264 support built-in (and some also have WebM and Ogg VIdeo, Explorer and Safari being notable exceptions). Youtube supplies WebM if your browser supports that, otherwise MP4.
But yes, VLC could run a lot smoother, and there are alternatives that do. Try
SMPlayer.
