BD-rip, ISO = No subtitles? (2 Viewers)

[jonaskp]

I have not experienced issues yet, so I'll continue doing it this way until I do. Thanks for the advice though, I will be on the lookout for it.
Another problem with just ripping to BD, is that MP can't display the Audio tracks correctly either. I discovered that I could actually select the different audio tracks, but I could not see the names of them.

 

[ixian]

I have one question. When using HdBrStreamExtractor (instead of Another EAC, I still can't get that to work properly) I can select what format I want to output my audion in. The Lossless audio format I use FLAC. But with the DTS audio, I have the option to extract as either DTS (if it's a DTS audio track) or AC3. Which is better? And will MP have trouble with the first one?

I am muxing a disc now, using DTS, so I'll guess I'll find out, but it would be nice with some expert advice.

DTS is tricky. The reason you see it outputting to DTS format is because your system doesn't have a way to convert DTS in to FLAC. The reason it doesn't is because the codecs needed to do it aren't freely available - there's a specific Arcsoft one that will do it, along with a commercial one I can't remember the name of. Right now if you just rip the DTS track raw you won't have a system that can play it - it will default to whatever lossy track you did rip.

There's more on this on Doom9 in the EAC2AC3 forum.

I was previously muxing all my BD rips into MKV but I stopped as I had random failures. On some clips video got artifacts, lipsync trouble etc. Same stuff was experienced by other users on mkvtoolnix thread. I didn't feel it was really worth the hassle after all those unreliable results. That's the reason why now I rip my movies into BD movie only and just add one subfile into STREAM folder. And same time I still have original BD subs stored in the file (more colors and partial transparency). I'm hoping that MP will play subs just fine later on even without IDX/SUB subs (it's bound to happen someday), so I don't feel like going into MKV.

But if MKV works for you, just go for it, it takes less space and you can use flac.

Well "random failures" can mean a wide range of things. It could be codecs. Or an older version of mkvtoolnix. But probably codecs. Muxing shouldn't have any effect on audio/video quality but in the end, it's a PC, everyone is different so do what works for you but I've actually watched a lot of the movies I've ripped (instead of just archiving them) and I don't have any problems. Heck, the Directors' Cut of Kingdom of Heaven is 48gb and 3 hours and there isn't a single problem with it.

 

[jonaskp]

I have one question. When using HdBrStreamExtractor (instead of Another EAC, I still can't get that to work properly) I can select what format I want to output my audion in. The Lossless audio format I use FLAC. But with the DTS audio, I have the option to extract as either DTS (if it's a DTS audio track) or AC3. Which is better? And will MP have trouble with the first one?

I am muxing a disc now, using DTS, so I'll guess I'll find out, but it would be nice with some expert advice.

DTS is tricky. The reason you see it outputting to DTS format is because your system doesn't have a way to convert DTS in to FLAC. The reason it doesn't is because the codecs needed to do it aren't freely available - there's a specific Arcsoft one that will do it, along with a commercial one I can't remember the name of. Right now if you just rip the DTS track raw you won't have a system that can play it - it will default to whatever lossy track you did rip.

There's more on this on Doom9 in the EAC2AC3 forum.

The DTS track can't be converted to FLAC, but the DTS HD Master Audio can? Or am I missing something here.

And with the DTS audio, should I then just output it as AC3? Either way, it is lossy I suppose. And if my system can't even play the DTS track, then that won't do me any good anyway.

 

[ixian]

The DTS track can't be converted to FLAC, but the DTS HD Master Audio can? Or am I missing something here.

And with the DTS audio, should I then just output it as AC3? Either way, it is lossy I suppose. And if my system can't even play the DTS track, then that won't do me any good anyway.

I admit to not being the expert at eac3to First thing I would do is read the Wiki for it:

eac3to/FAQ - Wikibooks, collection of open-content textbooks

Which explains everything it can and cannot do.

I mis-spoke about your situation - you *can* extract the "core" DTS track from DTS Master/DTS HD with eac3to - those formats contain a native core DTS track anyway (for backwards compatibility) so no conversion to Flac is needed; Mediaportal should play that core DTS track just fine, assuming you have a good codec setup (SAF is one example) on your PC.

If however you want to convert DTS Master/DTS HD audio in to lossless Flac, you will need the Arcsoft Codec. I researched around and TMT (Arcsoft Total Media Theater) includes the necessary codec; all you need to do is make sure it's installed on your C: drive otherwise eac3to won't be able to find it.

Arcsoft, being spoilsports, have decided to no longer offer demo versions of TMT but some user on AVSForum was nice enough to upload the demo to Megaupload - link here: MEGAUPLOAD - The leading online storage and file delivery service

Note that you don't actually need TMT, just the audio codec that comes with it. This means you can install a demo version of TMT - it doesn't matter if/when the demo expires, you don't care about the TMT application itself, just the codec, and it won't expire. If you don't like the idea of TMT cluttering up your hard drive then you can try to be clever and manually extract/register the codec yourself, I'm sure it's possible, just not sure how to do it. Since I have an HDPVR for TV, and it comes with TMT, I have it installed anyway and so never really thought about it since eac3to "magically" converted DTS to Flac for me anyway

 

[jonaskp]

So you are saying that all the .mkv files I have made so far, does not contain the TrueHD or DTS Master Audio tracks? That the .flac audio I have in my files are just downsamples?

I'm not sure I understand all of this.
I tried following your link, but didn't find an answer.
Thanks for the help so far.

[edit]Think I get some of it now. It's only the DTS Master Audio that is not lossless, the TrueHD should still be fine.

 

[ixian]

So you are saying that all the .mkv files I have made so far, does not contain the TrueHD or DTS Master Audio tracks? That the .flac audio I have in my files are just downsamples?

I'm not sure I understand all of this.
I tried following your link, but didn't find an answer.
Thanks for the help so far.

[edit]Think I get some of it now. It's only the DTS Master Audio that is not lossless, the TrueHD should still be fine.

Correct. Basically, if you got a .flac file, then you got a converted lossless audio file. eac3to handles most HD audio just fine. Only DTS Master audio, which few BD disks have, required the Arcsoft codec to convert to lossless .flac. If you don't have that, then when you attempt to convert a DTS Master track, it will extract the embedded, compressed DTS stream that all DTS Master tracks have for compatibility reasons instead. That track will be called *.dts, just like lossy AC3 tracks have a .ac3 extension. Mediaportal can play those just fine.

Blame the studios for all the confusion - right now you can buy a Bluray disk that can one of 4 different kinds of "HD" audio or no HD audio at all. Audio definitely got the short end of the stick in the HD disk wars, partially (I believe) because while a lot of consumers have "HDTV" these days not nearly as many have full on 5.1/7.1 surround setups, and fewer still the kind of surround setups that fully support HDMI and lossless/HD audio.

 

[jonaskp]

I think part of my confusion is because I am not using AnotherEAC, but the other Tool "HD BD Stream Extractor". In this program, I can choose what the different streams are outputted as. And when I had an DTS Master Audio, I outputted it as FLAC. I see now that this is not correct, since it is in fact not lossless. Must look into that later.

Btw, the link to that Arcsoft software earlier, didn't work. Or, the download worked, but the file I downloaded said it was corrupted. Maybe I was just unlucky.

 

[risu]

Well "random failures" can mean a wide range of things. It could be codecs. Or an older version of mkvtoolnix. But probably codecs. Muxing shouldn't have any effect on audio/video quality but in the end, it's a PC, everyone is different so do what works for you but I've actually watched a lot of the movies I've ripped (instead of just archiving them) and I don't have any problems. Heck, the Directors' Cut of Kingdom of Heaven is 48gb and 3 hours and there isn't a single problem with it.

Actually all my IQ problems were with mkvtoolnix, can't say for sure about lipsync etc. If you browse through mkvtoolnix dev thread over doom you can spot quite amount of users having random failures. And yes, most of them has been corrected while issues arise, but I didn't like watching every converted file afterwards just to make sure it worked. And I did experience situations where data was corrupted. I'm sure mkv will be better when time passes by as all different stream types get better support (things can't evolve that much in blu-ray as it is standardized).

Regarding MKV audiotracks. There really is NO reason to convert regular DTS or AC3 into lossless FLAC. You don't gain ANY audio quality and your files will be larger. Only reason to use FLAC is to convert DTS Master Audio, EAC3 and TrueHD tracks with full resolution. And EAC3 is questionable too if your system has correct audio codec available for it. EAC3 dev thread has list of all needed codecs for each audio stream type to have perfect sound conversion for FLAC.

 

[kidi]

Nobody tried "clownbd" ?

It scans your bd disc/directory and allows you to choose which audio tracks and subtitles you wish to keep and then does everything else.

I use it to save space on my bd-rips (45go to 25go for example), keeping only the english HD track and english and french subtitles (as I am French) and then it does all the work and even creates the .iso by itself using ImgBurn.

Now I know the point of this thread was how not having an .iso, but clownbd can also give you a .mkv file if I'm not mistaken (you just have to choose what file format you want as an output).

Worth a look in my opinion

 

[risu]

I'm sure many have used it. I know I've used it on some cases. But sometimes stuff still needs to be dealt manually.