Using DVD2SVCD for DVD output with AC3 audio

[manolito]

Arr... its the other way around
Oops, sorry....:eek:

[Nick]

This might work for ChickenMan's problem with mono audio:

Create a madplay.bat file as follows

madplay.exe -S %1 %2 %3 %4 %5 %6 %7 %8 %9 %10 %11 %12 %13 %14 %15 %16 %17 %18 %19 %20

Save it to the same folder as madplay.exe and set DVD2SVCD to use it.

This will simply force the -S switch and pass on all DVD2SVCD's other commandline parameters to Madplay, thus always creating a stereo wav. This should work in all circumstances as Madplay doesn't run unless audio is mono or stereo - it isn't used for 5.1. A stereo output wav should work with the plugin.

Obviously for reasons previously stated I can't test this but I think the principle is sound.

[manolito]

Right now I cannot test this because I do not have any sources with mono audio. But the madplay.bat file could be a little more simple:
madplay.exe -S %*should do...

Cheers
manolito

[Nick]

(facepalm)

Long while since I've done batch

[ChickenMan]

Fan-bloody-tastic, as we would say here in Oz. It works !!!! Ran same file through and madplay created a STEREO wav this time and therefore a stereo AC3 was produced. Tried it on an avi with stereo mp3 also and that still works fine.

One thing, you have to include the full path to madplay ie. "c:\Program Files\DVD2SVCD\Madplay\madplay.exe" -S %* otherwise you get an error (in the madplay_log.txt) saying madplay.exe is not an internal or external command.

Thanks again guys, you both came through in the hour of need. Many thanks and much appreciated.

[manolito]

What do you think about this generic version of madplay.bat ?

"%~dp0madplay.exe" -S %*

Or, in order to make it more readable:

SET mad_path=%~dp0
"%mad_path%madplay.exe" -S %*


Cheers
manolito

[ChickenMan]

Looks okay to me, but its very late here and I'm off to bed, so will check it out tomorrow. Thanks.

[Nick]

One quick question beforehand - possibly obvious!

Did you save your madplay.bat the the directory with madplay in it? Or did you save it in the BeSweet folder with the other bat files? In which case of course, it wouldn't find madplay.exe without the full path...

[ChickenMan]

I dropped it in the MADPLAY folder as its really got nothing to do with BeSweet.

I also tried manolito's latest amendment and it works fine also. Thanks guys :)

[manolito]

I already mentioned that I did not have a source with mono audio for testing, so I made one...

Captured MJPEG AVI, audio converted to MP3, 64 kbps, mono, 8 bit resolution, 44.1 sample rate. In one word: As incompatible as it gets.

DVD2SVCD took forever to extract the audio, but it did it without errors. The extracted audio had the .mpa extension, but it was MP3. MadPlay was called through madplay.bat (forcing stereo output), and the resulting WAV file was stereo 16 bit 44.1 sample rate. The AC3Enc plugin then converted the sample rate to 48 kHz and changed the bitrate to the specified value.

Conclusion: Perfect! The MadPlay hack deserves a space on Nick's download page.


Cheers
manolito

[Nick]

Great stuff. Seems pretty foolproof.

I shall email all the files to work, where I have access to a Windows machine and rebuild the installers to install the madplay batch file also.

@ChickenMan, As for the exe's, if you want to try to further this project, how about downloading freeBASIC (http://downloads.sourceforge.net/fbc/FreeBASIC-v0.20.0b-win32.exe?download), downloading the sources (http://nickspage.pwp.blueyonder.co.uk/ac3enc8.zip) and compiling your own executable for AC3Enc8.exe in a Win7 environment. See if that works. Otherwise I'm stumped. As we only have Vista at work I can't do much more.

Any which way I doubt this plugin is in terribly wide use nowadays so if you're happy with the batch files don't worry about it.

[ChickenMan]

Thanks Nick, your right, I'm happy with the bat file as it works, it cant get much better than that. However, I will have a play with FreeBasic when I get some spare time.

[Nick]

OK Here goes:
New build 20/04/2010 FINAL


Fixed: Sources with mono audio now work thanks to madplay.bat solution above. Installer now installs this file and updates the ini files to use it instead of calling madplay.exe directly

Fixed: Better integration with BatchMux plugin - The readme with said plugin suggests you place dvdaut_hack.exe in the DVDAuthor folder but states this isn't mandatory. The installer for AC3Enc plugin did not detect the presence of the plugin if the file was elsewhere. It now should.

Fixed: ChickenMan's issues with Windows 7 32-bit. This seems to be a fluke but I'm not complaining!


Download links in original post now link to latest build.
There are no code changes to the main files so if you already have a working plugin you can update without a full reinstall. Just download http://nickspage.pwp.blueyonder.co.uk/madplay.zip
and follow the instructions in the readme.

And that, guys, was that. It's been fun reuniting the AC3Enc plugin dream team one final time but this really is it. I've put this one to bed, tucked in the covers and now I'm leaving her be.

DVD2SVCD hasn't been updated in half a decade and for something that is essentially a GUI for a series of external applications, it is a tribute to how well designed the original project was that it is still even spoken of. Morever, its remaining userbase can hack every phase - audio encoding, video encoding, muxing and authoring - to use different applications from those it was designed for and continue to do so rather than simply using something else! Nevertheless, times move on, things change and from a personal viewpoint, I see no merit in investing any further time on this.

The executables were programmed in FreeBASIC and the installers built with Nullsoft Scriptable Install System. All the source files are contained here
http://nickspage.pwp.blueyonder.co.uk/sources.zip
for anyone who ever may wish to do anything else with this.

Be warned though, if you wake her up, when it comes to getting her back down afterwards, you're on your own :)

[ChickenMan]

Thank you Nick for all the above, the mono to stereo bit was the only lasting problem with D2S that I have found, but now fixed :)

I know DVD2SVCD is getting somewhat old now and probably not used by anyone thats new into converting (nor many of us oldies either) as it looks so complicated compared to many other 1 click wonders around. However, there is simply no other converter that is so darn flexible with out of spec input files, use of best encoders, quality ac3 conversions and fully compliant authoring. I have tried just about every avi to dvd converter available, but I just keep coming back to DVD2SVCD.

[manolito]

Could not have said it any better than ChickenMan. As long as I keep converting to DVD output I will certainly keep using DVD2SVCD. IMO nothing else can touch it, and like ChickenMan I tried most other available converters.

Right now I am not ready to make the switch to High Definition, but a friend already asked me if I could help him convert some Blue Ray disks to DVD for watching on his laptop while he is on the road. Well, I don't even have a Blue Ray player, but I am confident that DVD2SVCD will be able to handle this task, too.


Anyway, thanks so much to Nick for his contributions, it has been a lot of fun working with him...:)


Cheers
manolito