Ripped subtitles don't show up in my players

[radman7815]

Hello,

My apology if this is something obvious, but your tech guru advice would be much appreciated.

Whenever I try to rip a Bluray disc and select specific subtitles (in addition to audio), the only way the resulting ripped MKV files play subtitles is on my Mac using VLC Player software. This is the only way I have found to play ripped Bluray MKV files and also show subtitles.

Two hardware players that I love to use for playing my movies are SONY Blu-ray players, and Western Digital WD Live Hub box. I have no idea why they do not show subtitles when playing ripped MakeMKV files. These players do show subtitles from a variety of other mkv files I have from other sources (so they work OK), but never from those I personally ripped from Bluray discs using MakeMKV.

Is there some specific way to rip a Bluray disc in MakeMKV, and have subtitles play on these devices? Maybe I am doing something wrong when I rip them? Any ideas, or experience you guys have with these devices? Info much appreciated,

Thanks!
Rad

[Woodstock]

There are flags associated with subtitle tracks for players. Not all players obey the same flags.

There is a "Default" flag, which is associated with the language, and tells the player to (by default) display this subtitle when playing this language.

There is a "Forced" flag, which tells the player to (by default) display this subtitle REGARDLESS of the selected language.

Some players want D, others want F, and some want BOTH.

I've found that using mkvtoolnix to set BOTH flags on a particular track works for all players I've seen so far, but I haven't seen all of them. I've scripted my handbrake conversions to put the subtitle tracks I want most as the first and second track in a file, then have mkvtoolnix flag the first with both D and F

[radman7815]

Thanks for the info! I am completely new both to Handbrake and mkvtoolnix, but you definitely shed some light on what I may need to learn next, and how to go about it. Much appreciated!

[Nucleus]

Whenever I try to rip a Bluray disc and select specific subtitles (in addition to audio), the only way the resulting ripped MKV files play subtitles is on my Mac using VLC Player software. This is the only way I have found to play ripped Bluray MKV files and also show subtitles

Link in my sig, which also applies to setting a default subtitle - not necessarily forced. Set A Subtitle Stream On By Default (Forced)

[radman7815]

Thanks, guys!! Darn, I got a lot to learn, but all this is really useful info to get me started. Looks like familiarity with MKVToolnix is a must, and I have never played with it before... Without having subs in foreign movies playing on my hardware players, I have to resort to hooking up my laptop's HDMI to TV and playing movies from VLC, which I consider a pain in the a$$.