Idiots’ Guide to Downloading Anime/Seiyuu Radio Shows
A rough, quick guide to downloading anime & seiyuu web radio shows for idiots, by an idiot.
So I’m hopeless at tech stuff myself too but with these are the methods I’ve been using for the last 4-5(?) years to get hold of radio shows, stuff I learnt from my own muddling experiences – maybe someone out there will find it useful. I do kinda assume that you’d have some basic knowledge of stuff like Greasemonkey scripts, how to work Nico Nico Douga and that you can comprehend basic Japanese (otherwise you wouldn’t bother to listen to radio shows, right?). I figure if a technophobe like me can understand things like this then you should too.
Programs I use: URLSnooper + HiDownload (cracked)
-Please don’t ask me where I got the cracked HiD (which eliminates the 30-day trial evaluation), google is your best friend :3
How to Download:
Load URLSnooper, start sniffing the network & then navigate to the page where the radio programme is located and click on the link to the desired show. You’ll see a bunch of mumbo-jumbo pop up in the URLSnooper window and it should be easy to spot the url of the file you want, usually something like [mms://blabla.com/s4m_1g.wma] or similar (see screenshot above).
Then just right click & copy the URL to clipboard, fire up HiDownload, click Add, input the URL and click OK – you’re ready to start downloading. This method has near 100% success rate as long as you target the right file.
Lantis-net is the simplest to get stuff from, hosted files always follow the same format and I don’t even need to bother to visit their site to get what I want every week. The same goes for MediaFactory.
Onsen.ag is a bit annoying since they started using Silverlight, which has been successful in crashing almost every browser I use except Internet Explorer. Most of the shows are uploaded on Nico Nico Douga though, so I usually get them off there instead of loading crappy Onsen and watching my CPU usage go up to 100%.
Edit: There’s a non-Silverlight page!
Animate.tv: Same as the usual method, except now you’ll need a Japanese proxy IP since we gaijin are all blocked. Just test to see which is the fastest one you can find off Samair, Proxy4Free or any other proxy site and dump it in the settings for HiDownload (Options/Proxy Server/mms). Preferrably try to download at not-so-congested times, Sunday 7am Japan time would be ideal 
Getting a decent proxy is down to luck I guess… also, don’t bother going near the Animate site on Mondays, which is Hetalia day.
Nico Nico Douga: Easiest & guaranteed method – just load the whole video using Opera browser then grab the file from the cache, usually located at C:\\Docs & Settings\[username]\AppData\Opera\Opera\Profile\cache4 – it’s usually either in flv or mp4 format.
If you use Firefox, then install one of the Greasemonkey scripts that enables you to pull downloads off the Niconico page itself (nicovideon or nicopon). I think they both still work, I don’t use Firefox anymore (using Google Chrome) so I can’t test them. NND is probably the most useful site for radio for me, and is sometimes the only way to get to hear the shows that air on mainstream stations like Radio Osaka & Tokyo FM.
Edit: Readers recommend NicoFox, which I haven’t tried myself.
Bunka Housou/JOQR: If you have the patience, you can listen to (and rip) live streams off Bunka Housou where a lot of the good shows like Tamura Yukari’s Itazura Kuro Usagi, Anispa, Comchart, Mizuki Nana’s Smile Gang and Horie Yui’s Tentama reside. For this you will need preferably Winamp (any other media player, ie WMP will do fine), Peercast and Streamripper [or any other stream ripper you use]. Once you’ve downloaded and installed all the programs, go to Peercast Yellow Pages, locate the JOQR(test) station, click play and start ripping away. Quality is often pretty poor, but this is what I turn to when I get impatient waiting for Japanese users to upload stuff to NND/Winny. I used this method a lot 3-4 years ago before Niconico got popular.
Youtube: Eh, I’m guessing maybe you may occasionally find stuff you want on Youtube, and the easiest way is to just stick the link in the box at one of the various media grabber sites, I use File2HD myself. Simple as ABC.
I suppose you could record shows off streams or something but I always download first and listen later, especially as my connection sucks too much to let me stream stuff without it turning into a stutterfest. Oh, and all these methods also apply to video files, obviously. Anyone else wanna share easier or more sophisticated methods to get at the radio shows? I’d love to know.
It takes seconds now for popular radio shows to get uploaded in NND. I only listen to less than five radio shows regularly anyway. I use Firefox plugin called NicoFox, you just need to click the download button next to the video link.
I use NicoFox too, it’s quick, convenient, and totally user-friendly.
Awsome post!!! Tons of tips I never knew about (like the opera cache one). Thanks for staying on top of things, ur blog rocks!
I get most of my radio (direct streaming in WMP) off the various websites themselves, usually through http://geek-p.com/. The rest of the shows (mostly broadcast stuff) I get through NicoNico. I use http://nicosound.dip.jp/ to get audio only off NND, never had the need to download video directly off NND (though now I know where to look if I need to!
)
One thing to avoid the silverlight page for Onsen.ag is to use the low tech version: http://www.onsen.ag/index2.html – simple and effective.
Hopefully with the new proxy sites I can get the damn Animate.tv to work…thanks for the help anyway!
@danie~ & OtaAgg
Maybe I should check out NicoFox… if I ever install Firefox again =_=
@Jigga
Ah, cheers for the Onsen tip. I haven’t listened to any show from there for ages ^^;
Hm, I don’t suppse you have any minamike radio shows or the old toshokan sensou radio shows? The toshokan sensou links on your blogs no longer seem to work.
In response to Ikari, Toshokan Sensou radio shows are part of animate.tv. Read “Hetalia fuss is causing Animate.tv servers to melt down” and it will give you the reasons why the links don’t work.
For nico downloads I recommend craving explorer, it let’s you download the video in most of the major formats or download the audio only and also works with youtube.
http://www.crav-ing.com/
@Ikari: In case you’ll see this… i’m hardcore fan enough and secured ToshoSen radio files and you’ll an get them here :O
@j1m0ne: cute enough.. though i usually use DP media for downloading … no need to have 2 programs, just copy the right asx file and you’re ready to go :3 (just doesn’t work well with videos… or maybe i’m to stupid to understand how that works >_<)
@Ikari
Heh, I had the Toshokan Senso files too but Chibi-Chibi has already uploaded them. As for Minakike, I have the 4 Okaeri ones so far & only bits and pieces from the previous season.
@Kai
Hmmm, interesting. Though I’m not keen on d/ling yet another browser…
@Chibi-Chibi
Yeah, the thing about the method I use is that although it’s tedious and takes extra steps, I can sniff out all sorts of crap I wanna download including images/video files etc that are hidden behind a wall of scripts
Um… What if you’re using a mac?
@anony mouse
I have noooooo idea. Never used a mac in my life before – it’s not a feasible choice for a technophobe in a backwater state, I’m afraid ;(
It’s okay, I found the mac version of Nicofox. But I can only download the sound in .mp3 format and not the video. lol.
FWIW, on Linux and other Unices (I wouldn’t be surprised if there were more user-friendly options, but I like command-line stuff):
- for YouTube, there’s youtube-dl: http://www.arrakis.es/~rggi3/youtube-dl/
- for NicoNico, there’s niconico-dl: http://sourceforge.jp/projects/nicovideo-dl/
Given a URL, these programs download the corresponding .sfv or .mp4. Mplayer can play both these formats and also extract the audio from them.
To get the mms:// URL, I usually just look at the .asx file (it’s a simple text file), but if you really want to sniff the traffic, you can use tcpdump or ethereal.
To download the mms:// stream, mplayer usually does the job with
mplayer -dumpstream -dumpfile file.wma mms://host/path/to/file.wma
But today I found out that this doesn’t work that well if you need a proxy
. After searching a little, I found mimms and with
http_proxy=http://someproxy mimms mmsh://mars.primestage.net/solidex/animate/r09010097_qj5bcb_nb.wma
I managed to download the latest marimite webradio ^^/ (I used mmsh:// instead of mms:// just to make it use the http proxy directly without waiting for the mms:// connection to timeout).
All these programs are installable on debian/ubuntu with a simple “aptitude install program-name”. They all probably also work on mac and, other than mimms, even on windows.
I am forced to use a lot of OS (I work as a technician and linux system admin at a local varsity) and honestly, if you want to do something hassle free and easy just go for windows. While I love Macs, it’s not worth it to do something like this lol
Also might want to use the free Orbit Downloader. It has an inbuilt FLV downloader, and it’s spyware/addons free, which is quite surprising for a totally free software
Mediacatcher (Applian) is a very good tool too and do not need “cracking” in an usual meaning of this word. It let me download preview-version PVs from Lantis pages about newcoming singles while no other program helps. I even uploaded that PV on youtube before Lantis, lol.
By the way, what about radio shows in the strange .smi(or aac) format? Some time ago Minorhythm was in this format and no matter what I did, I wasnt able to download/listen to downloaded files. Thank God they switched to wma.
wow you guys are good. anyone has the ga-rei zero ones?
@blurry
The Ga-rei ones are all on NicoDouga if you have an account, check out http://www.nicovideo.jp/mylist/9007397
I do have all the archived shows as well, if you have any specific episodes you’re looking for let me know and I’ll see what I can do (after the weekend).
hi @j1m0ne
i’m looking for the january 2009 ones actually and the 1st 6 (i didn’t know they started in oct 2008). i missed these totally due to accursed pc deadness.
if you could kindly help, would much appreciate it. no hurry though. good things should be enjoyed slowly =p