Crashing on some IPTV channels (2 Viewers)

[steviewunda]

Totally understandable - I'll remind you once a month, and sooner or later the planets will line up ;-)

 

[Owlsroost]

I've spent some time investigating the issue.

The problem appears to be caused by missing or corrupted PCR timestamps in the file (which is why the duration of the file looks wrong e.g. 1.6 seconds instead of the actual 2 minutes 9 seconds. The file data from Mediainfo:

General
ID                                       : 4 (0x4)
Complete name                            : D:\Video\TV Server\Movie - US _ HBO 2 - 2019-03-13_1.ts
Format                                   : MPEG-TS
File size                                : 80.2 MiB
Duration                                 : 1 s 600 ms
Overall bit rate mode                    : Variable
Overall bit rate                         : 417 Mb/s

Video
ID                                       : 48 (0x30)
Menu ID                                  : 137 (0x89)
Format                                   : AVC
Format/Info                              : Advanced Video Codec
Format profile                           : Main@L3.1
Format settings                          : CABAC / 1 Ref Frames
Format settings, CABAC                   : Yes
Format settings, RefFrames               : 1 frame
Format settings, GOP                     : M=1, N=60
Codec ID                                 : 27
Duration                                 : 2 min 9 s
Width                                    : 1 280 pixels
Height                                   : 720 pixels
Display aspect ratio                     : 16:9
Color space                              : YUV
Chroma subsampling                       : 4:2:0
Bit depth                                : 8 bits
Scan type                                : Progressive
Color range                              : Full
Color primaries                          : BT.709
Transfer characteristics                 : BT.709
Matrix coefficients                      : BT.709

Audio
ID                                       : 64 (0x40)
Menu ID                                  : 137 (0x89)
Format                                   : AAC
Format/Info                              : Advanced Audio Codec
Format version                           : Version 4
Format profile                           : LC
Muxing mode                              : ADTS
Codec ID                                 : 15
Duration                                 : 2 min 8 s
Bit rate mode                            : Variable
Channel(s)                               : 2 channels
Channel positions                        : Front: L R
Sampling rate                            : 48.0 kHz
Frame rate                               : 46.875 FPS (1024 SPF)
Compression mode                         : Lossy
Delay relative to video                  : -101 ms

Note the video and audio stream durations (based on the presentation timestamps) are correct, but the 'general' duration (based on PCR timestamps) is only 1.6 seconds.

MP uses the 'general' PCR timestamps to determine the file duration and also when seeking in the file (for skip steps and fast-forward/rewind) - so not having correct ones is fairly fundamental.

I'm pretty sure this mismatch is causing the playback problems (both with MP and in Windows media player etc.) - basically in MP it appears to stop fetching data from the file after a while (so it freezes), but I haven't worked out why (yet).

So no fix yet, but some progress.