smartLabs tsMuxeR: Transport Stream muxer

[cwm9]

I keep seeing references to how "true-hd doesn't work with tsMuxer," but I don't seem to have any problem with it. When I rip just the video and only the True-HD track as a as a blue ray disk, convert to a .iso, mount it with DaemonTools, and play it in PowerDVD, it works just fine. PowerDVD even says it is playing a "Audio: Dolby TrueHD 5.1 xxxxKbps" stream. 1500KBps is about typical.

Is PowerDVD lying? Is it only playing the AC3 core? Has the true-hd problem been fixed, or is it only a problem with certain discs or... ?

[odin24]

Originally Posted by cwm9

I keep seeing references to how "true-hd doesn't work with tsMuxer," but I don't seem to have any problem with it. When I rip just the video and only the True-HD track to a .iso, mount it with DaemonTools, and play it in PowerDVD, it works just fine.

Has the true-hd problem been fixed, or is it only a problem with certain discs or... ?

The issue is TrueHD playback on a PS3 or standalone (after tsMuxeR).

[LonelyWolf]

Ok, tsmuxer can't mux correctly h264 stream with 5.1 level, tsremux doesn't.

tsmuxer adds from 9'.30" to 10' to the clip "time".

So the clip's duration depend on how it's muxed?

Originally Posted by frank

Oh no, you have a lot to learn.

It's true and i know!

But if the problem is the video track 5.1 on my standalone, why muxing with tsremux goes fine and with tsmuxer doesn't? The track is the same in both mux cases.

[jj666]

If you are playing back on a standalone player, the best thing to do is confine any 5.1 encoded files to processing from the recycle bin. Having to re-encode an already re-encoded HD file totally defeats the idea of HD feeds being better quality. You can check the number of reference frames with MEDIAINFO, if it is 4 or below for 1080p, or 8 or below for 720p, it may be possible to change the level to 4.1 with H264INFO.

I can tell you with 100% confidence that TSMUXER does not have issues with H264 per se based on my own personal remuxing of hundred of personal files. I can also tell you I've never seen such an issue with timing with either the small number of re-encodes I do, or with remuxes direct from original source.

Ask your torrent site or whatever to post the codec information before downloading in future and avoid 5.1 encodes like the plague ;-) It's not possible to make a bug report about something you didn't encode yourself as it's not reproducable easily.

-jj-

[Bosko]

Originally Posted by odin24

The issue is TrueHD playback on a PS3 or standalone (after tsMuxeR).

So if you have an .mkv file of a tv show that's "HD" and you use this program to make it so it can be played on a PS3, it won't be in HD? So will it just be the same as the regular .avi file version of the same show?

Thanks!

[odin24]

Originally Posted by Bosko

So if you have an .mkv file of a tv show that's "HD" and you use this program to make it so it can be played on a PS3, it won't be in HD? So will it just be the same as the regular .avi file version of the same show?

Thanks!

I was refering to Dolby TrueHD (on Blu-rays), you'll still get the "HD" if you use this to convert TV show mkv's.

[asarian]

First off, I think tsMuxeR is a fantastic programme! I use it all the time. :) Lately though I learnt that an age-old issue, which I heretofore attributed to something else, may in fact be caused by tsMuxer, after all. Namely, when streaming an (H264/AVC) .m2ts file (made with tsMuxeR) to my PS3, I can't properly use the 'goto' function. When I say, for instance, "Go to time-index 01:25:54," then, 9 out of 10 times, the request is either simply ignored, or the movie just pauses indefinately.

Now, I recently heard that VOB files, created by mkv2vob, do not have this problem! So, that begs the question: what is causing tsMuxeR to not get it right? Or, more importantly, what, if anything, can be done to fix this? I reckon if mkv2vob can manage, tsMuxeR should be able to do so as well, right?

[Jeff Flowerday]

Originally Posted by asarian

First off, I think tsMuxeR is a fantastic programme! I use it all the time. Lately though I learnt that an age-old issue, which I heretofore attributed to something else, may in fact be caused by tsMuxer, after all. Namely, when streaming an (H264/AVC) .m2ts file (made with tsMuxeR) to my PS3, I can't properly use the 'goto' function. When I say, for instance, "Go to time-index 01:25:54," then, 9 out of 10 times, the request is either simply ignored, or the movie just pauses indefinately.

Now, I recently heard that VOB files, created by mkv2vob, do not have this problem! So, that begs the question: what is causing tsMuxeR to not get it right? Or, more importantly, what, if anything, can be done to fix this? I reckon if mkv2vob can manage, tsMuxeR should be able to do so as well, right?

I think the problem may be the PS3 not tsmuxer. The goto function on my Popcorn works fine with H264 m2ts files created by tsmuxer.

[asarian]

Originally Posted by Jeff Flowerday

I think the problem may be the PS3 not tsmuxer. The goto function on my Popcorn works fine with H264 m2ts files created by tsmuxer.

The odd thing is, sometimes it does it work, and it jumps directly to the requested index. Could this be key-frame related somehow? I just don't get why sometimes I get a hit, and often a miss.

[ultratoto14]

Is your problem occurring during streaming or even if the file is on the PS3 hard drive ?

[asarian]

Originally Posted by ultratoto14

Is your problem occurring during streaming or even if the file is on the PS3 hard drive ?

Just streaming.

[ultratoto14]

It seems to be a problem of Tversity i guess. Someone tell us some time ago a tip : when remuxing mkv or m2ts to ts/m2ts with tsMuxer, check the fps change box on h264 stream and put the real fps of the stream. This forces tsMuxer to write fps in each place it must be and this can help with ffw/rewind during streaming. Test it and let me now.

[asarian]

Originally Posted by ultratoto14

It seems to be a problem of Tversity i guess. Someone tell us some time ago a tip : when remuxing mkv or m2ts to ts/m2ts with tsMuxer, check the fps change box on h264 stream and put the real fps of the stream. This forces tsMuxer to write fps in each place it must be and this can help with ffw/rewind during streaming. Test it and let me now.

I'm using Twonky, but I'm guessing the same principle applies as with Tversity. I'll try it out and let you know. Thanks!

[Cela]

Dear tsMuxeR experts,

I am very happy having found tsMuxeR.
Congratulations to its author for this excellent and very promising development!

It is higly efficient and easy to use. As first exercise being a tsMuxeR beginner, I managed to process a 16.804.145KB, 02:35:32 (hh:mm:ss) DVB-S2 (H264 stream, Profile: High@4.0, Resolution: 1920:1080i, Frame rate: 25) HDTV show from Astra HD channel to an AVCHD structure with 79 chapters which is playing well on PS3 (from USB disc after AVCHD_ME m2ts to MTS rename, and after burning the original tsMuxer output to AVCHD DVD and BE/BD disc) in amazing 09 min 12 sec muxing time !!! Practically in the time it takes to copy the 16.8 GB from USB-disc to internal harddisc! Unbeatable performance!

With my second exercise, to let tsMuxeR split the show into two parts (Part 1 and Part 2) at the intermission pause, I entered more difficult ground:
The splitting worked ok, but both parts were too big to fit on a DVD-DL each. So, I had to shorten each part.

Part 2 was easily done, merly trimming off the end credits by >Enable cutting, Start=938960 ms, End=5056 s.

Part 1 was not so easy. I wanted to keep the beginning (Part 1A) and cut out a chunck from within, keeping the rest (Part 1B). To do it was also no problem. But...

Issue 1: Audio sync after split
***********************
The problem began with >add Part 1A and >append Part 1B. tsMuxeR does the append job in lightning speed. But the audio of Part 1B is out of sync! I guess this happens because the cut was not at an IDR-frame.

Would an option in tsMuxeR "snap to nearest IDR-frame /P-frame" help, which could apply to chapter selection and splitting (cut-in, cut-out point selection) ? I think IfoEdit (my other favorite program for DVD generation) does it that way, I think.

Issue 2: Too many chapters
**********************
Again with Part 1, I found another issue. I left the Chapter input list as it was for the full show. From my experience with IfoEdit I expected tsMuxeR to only take those, in my case 24 (out of 79), chapters that fit after cutting into the resulting output stream for Part 1 and to skip chapters with time values higher than the total length of the Part 1 video clip.

Issue 3: Simple chapter selection menu(s) would be a dream !
**********************************************
3.1 Example for a simple, kind of table-of-contents like menu:
------------------------------------------
Highlights of Summer 2008 (heading)
------------------------------------------
Intro (-> chapter 1) (detail line 1)
Windsurfing at Lake Garda (-> chapter 7) (detail line 2)
Trip to Venice (-> chapter 12) (detail line 3)
...
------------------------------------------
(next menu window after 10 or 12 detail lines, max. 99 detail lines)

Input for the above example could be simple text lines like
<ch#><tab><menu text>
00 Highlights of Summer 2008 ... (heading)
01 Intro ....................... (detail line 1)
07 Windsurfing at Lake Garda
12 Trip to Venice
...
(To pep it up, tsMuxeR could allow to enter a jpg or bmp background image.)

3.2 Alternativly, is there a trick to use a small dummy clip and design a menu with another program (for example: NeroVision, Ulead DVD Movie Factory, Cyberlink PowerProducer, ...) and replace in the AVCHD data structure the .m2ts file of the dummy clip with the .m2ts files from tsMuxe R?
This alternative would enable more sophisticated menus. But I would prefer a simple, table-of-contents like menu.

I am a fairly experienced user of SD DVD authoring with IfoEdit and DVD-lab Pro after preparing the DVB-S captures with ProjectX and Mpeg2Schnitt (includig trimming, cutting and finding good values for chapters), but, as a beginner to the art of tsMuxeR and HD processing, I cannot resolve the above mentioned issues without help from tsMuxeR and HD processing experts.

So please help me with my issues!

Many thanks in advance!

Cela

P.S.
As I write these lines I get another dream:
Mpeg2Schnitt is a wonderful freeware program for trimming, cutting, finding good values for chapters the best ergonomic and userfriendly navigation through the audiovisual preview of mpeg2 SD material, among other things allowing forward/backward stepping to next I-, P- frames, etc. If it was possible to replace the mpeg2 engine by tsMuxeR's h264/avc engine, a modified Mpeg2Schnitt could become a graphic-interactive front-end for tsMuxeR. Now add the menu-engine of DVD-lab.... Perhaps an idea for new cooperations?

[asarian]

Originally Posted by ultratoto14

It seems to be a problem of Tversity i guess. Someone tell us some time ago a tip : when remuxing mkv or m2ts to ts/m2ts with tsMuxer, check the fps change box on h264 stream and put the real fps of the stream. This forces tsMuxer to write fps in each place it must be and this can help with ffw/rewind during streaming. Test it and let me now.

Wow! This actually worked! :) I can't believe it was that easily solved. Thanks very much!

[ultratoto14]

You're welcome !

[piratburner]

I have remuxed Million Dollar Baby 2004 1080p Blu-ray GER AVC DTS-HD HR 7.1 and only keep the Movie and the english DTS-HD 7.1

But it´s NO sound so cant TsMuxeR handle 7.1 sound ??

[jdobbs]

Not sure if this has been discussed (this is a long thread), so I thought I'd bring it up. TSMUXER seems to have a small bug that causes fast-forward, rewind, and seeking issues when creating Blu-ray output.

It appears as though the COARSE/FINE table relationship in the .CLPI file isn't being structured properly. The program correctly creates a new COARSE entry with the PTS rolls over (the LSBs contained in the FINE table get to a point where they will require an increment in the COARSE table). But it appears it doesn't do so (at least not always) when the same thing happens to the COARSE/FINE SPN. As a result, you have combined SPN pointers that suddenly drop to very small values (at least until the next COARSE reference)...

Just thought I'd mention it in case someone is keeping the package up-to-date. If not, I guess I can write a simple program to read/rewrite the CLPI (I'd rather see it fixed in the program, though). I just did one by hand and it fixed the problems -- now rewind/fast-forward works correctly and I no longer get "pauses" when I jump between chapters.

[jj666]

Originally Posted by piratburner

I have remuxed Million Dollar Baby 2004 1080p Blu-ray GER AVC DTS-HD HR 7.1 and only keep the Movie and the english DTS-HD 7.1

But it´s NO sound so cant TsMuxeR handle 7.1 sound ??

How are you trying to play the sound back? Have you tried downconverting to DTS and see if it works?

-jj-

[GZZ]

I just did one by hand and it fixed the problems -- now rewind/fast-forward works correctly and I no longer get "pauses" when I jump between chapters.

How did you open it?, I have problems with some chapters, like the picture freeze for at few seconds.