Can't seek to any location when playing a particular DVD

[mikeggsm]

On a regular commercial DVD, when I click on the seek bar (in MPC-HC or Windows Media Player), the cursor immediately moves back to its original position. I can play/pause but not jump to any location.

It works with other DVDs. How can I solve that?

Thanks.

[Inspector.Gadget]

Play it through a decryption layer such as AnyDVD which will remove Prohibited User Operations (PUOs) on the fly. If you still have problems, then I believe it must be the case that either the disc is broken in some way or you have a DirectShow filter that is acting up.

[mikeggsm]

Thanks for your help. Just tried AnyDVD: it makes the seek bar responsive, but it seeks to seemingly random locations instead of where I click... usually much earlier. Both in Windows Media Player and MPC-HC. The "jump forward/backward" keys in MPC-HC do the same random jumps. Argh!

The strange thing is that it works perfectly in VLC (I much prefer MPC-HC though), seeking during the logo is even possible -- even with AnyDVD the seek bar is grayed during the logo in MPC-HC and Windows Media Player.

I am not sure why... is there a specific filter which makes it work in VLC and not in MPC-HC, maybe the "demuxer" mentioned in VLC's module tree?

The demuxer used in VLC, "dvdnav", doesn't appear in the available external filters in MPC-HC, which uses a filter called "DVD Navigator" instead.

Is there a way to force MPC-HC to use VLC's filters?

Thanks.

[namaiki]

VLC uses it's own internal filters. I'm not sure if they're Directshow or available standalone.

[mikeggsm]

In Program Files (x86)\VideoLAN\VLC\plugins there is a file called libdvdnav_plugin.dll, I have tried to add it to the external filters in MPC-HC (clicking Add Filter -> "Browse") but it doesn't appear in the list after that, seems to be another format or unsupported somehow... Argh!

VLC does ignore all restrictions like anti-seek stuff so it's technically possible to do it... I don't understand why MPC-HC doesn't do the same.

[namaiki]

MPC-HC uses some Microsoft thing for DVDs, I think. There isn't really an alternative.

[setarip_old]

@mikeggsm

Hi!

Ive come across a few such DVDs that have no chaptering - "Elephant Man" (U.S.) is one.

What's the title and region number? (If I have the same DVD, I'd like to check it out)

[mikeggsm]

The DVD is "The Mysterious Cities of Gold" in French (region 2)... geeky nostalgia power! http://www.amazon.fr/mysterieuses-cites-dor-Lint%C3%A9grale/dp/B001IDPQ2K/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=dvd&qid=1274220243&sr=8-1

Just to be clear: you can choose episodes, the DVD menus work fine, only seeking doesn't work: during playback, trying to jump to any location fails.

[Milvus]

I don't have this particular disc set, but it does not suprise me, being DVDs from Kazé. This company seems to enjoy using strange authoring on their products : lots of PUO, seek disabled or buggy, all 5 episodes in the same title which appear only 24 min long... Utterly confusing for mplayer or VLC.

Two solutions :

- Bear with it, it's not a bug, it's a feature. Kazé knows what is good for you.
- Rip the discs. :devil:

[mikeggsm]

If it's a "feature"... but everything works great with VLC: since VLC has no problem seeking immediately to any location, it's technically possible to do it on these discs.

So I was trying to make it work with MPC-HC (which I prefer to VLC) but I'll probably end up using VLC. It would have been nice to see what filter is at fault in MPC-HC though, maybe try to use VLC's filter instead.

[mikeggsm]

Trying to make it work with VLC... I keep having annoying problems with it.

I want screenshots to be saved with a name like "Title (HH:MM:SS)". According to http://wiki.videolan.org/Documentation:Play_HowTo/Format_String you are supposed to set the snapshot name prefix string with

$t : title
$T : time code of the video

And it just doesn't work. $t is just replaced by blank, and when I use $T, the snapshot isn't saved at all.

Argh! Now I remember why I don't like VLC...

Any help on this?

EDIT: it's broken, known issue, no workaround. The taskbar also keeps appearing in fullscreen when clicking on the seek bar, known issue no workaround. It is also impossible to configure mouse behavior (eg left or middle click = play/pause etc). MPC-HC > VLC.

[Milvus]

If it's a "feature"... but everything works great with VLC: since VLC has no problem seeking immediately to any location, it's technically possible to do it on these discs.

So I was trying to make it work with MPC-HC (which I prefer to VLC) but I'll probably end up using VLC. It would have been nice to see what filter is at fault in MPC-HC though, maybe try to use VLC's filter instead.

You're probably lucky it works with VLC. I strongly suspect their DVDs to be non-compliant in some way, making the seek buggy with softwares that don't care about PUO or override them. So, you can't really say some filter is at fault for not managing to circumvent this problem. :rolleyes: