File problems leading to stopping playback in XBMC

[NJPhillips01]

OK, I have been using MakeMKV for a long time now, and successfully ripped 500 movies (DVDs and BRs) with no problems...until recently. I found the problem because XBMC started having problems. I noticed on several recently ripped movies (both DVDs and BRs) XBMC would stop playing the movie and go back to the main screen... Trying to resume the movie at the same stop would do nothing; the movie would start and immediately return to the main screen. Starting the movie from the beginning worked until the movie got to the exact spot it was at and XBMC would exit back to the main screen again. Stumped, I opened the MKV file in Cyberlink PDVD, and at the spot that XBMC was having its error, I could see the movie "twitch";... Similar to a jerk on a dual-sided DVD at the switch, but a little more noticeable. So, I believe it is a problem with the file, but it has only happened recently...so I am wondering what's going on with MakeMKV... I haven't updated recently, so not sure what's going on. Anybody else had similar issues?

[forumuser]

Hi,

I'm experiencing the very same problem when copying TV Show DVDs into single mkv files (per episode).
Some play fine but some do stop at the same position. xbmc log says read error.

I had mkvtoolnix, haali, .. installed but removed it from the system now. Could this make a difference or doesn't MakeMKV rely on anything like ffshow codec and so on?


Thanks!

[NJPhillips01]

Glad to know someone else is having the same problem. This has been posted for some time now with no love... Hopefully it's a version problem, as nothing on my system has changed.

[mike admin]

Do you see the same behavior on MKV file produced with 1.7.0 ?

[forumuser]

The error is hard to reproduce. Right now I'm watching some episodes to "test".

Only difference in procedure: I first create an ISO image/DVD folder structure, then use MakeMKV to extract episodes. Is it possible that those errors occured due to directly ripping from dvd drive?

[rosie]

I have experienced exactly the same problem across a number of MakeMKV versions.
I successfully backup whole BD's with MakeMKV (with decryption) and then create individual MKV's based on selective titles, normally including all subtitles and audio streams.
In a small number of cases, the MKV produced stops mid-playback in XBMC just as you have described. All other cases work perfectly (and always have done). The playback failure is consistent per MKV, but happens at different times for different films.
I normally test by playing created MKV's at 32x in XBMC, and the playback will fall over at exactly the same place each time. (It's quicker to test at 32x than in real time!).
Created M2TS files (from the BD playlist of the same decrypted material) work fine.

My current setup is XBMC Dharma on Ubuntu 10.10/Intel/ION connecting to a RAID5 NAS with Samba, playing MKV's made from Linux 1.7.0.

Will investigate .xbmc logging and try to replicate on a simpler setup (with other players etc.) and will post further info.

[rosie]

Attempted to replicate by performing the following:
Played a known 'problem' mkv encoded from the main movie title in 'American Gangster' (unfortunately with a unknown older version of MakeMKV), with expected crash (always at 27mins 14secs) and the following in ~/.xbmc/temp/xbmc.log:

08:20:04 T:1765800816 M:3397091328 ERROR: Decode - avcodec_decode_video returned failure
08:20:07 T:1753217904 M:3410010112 ERROR: Previous line repeats 29 times.
08:20:07 T:1753217904 M:3410010112 WARNING: CDVDMessageQueue(audio)::Get - asked for new data packet, with nothing available
08:20:07 T:1765800816 M:3410010112 WARNING: Previous line repeats 5 times.
08:20:07 T:1765800816 M:3410010112 ERROR: Decode - avcodec_decode_video returned failure
08:20:08 T:1753217904 M:3409883136 ERROR: Previous line repeats 1 times.
08:20:08 T:1753217904 M:3409883136 WARNING: CDVDMessageQueue(audio)::Get - asked for new data packet, with nothing available
08:20:08 T:1765800816 M:3409883136 WARNING: Previous line repeats 4 times.
08:20:08 T:1765800816 M:3409883136 ERROR: Decode - avcodec_decode_video returned failure
08:20:10 T:1753217904 M:3406819328 ERROR: Previous line repeats 6 times.
08:20:10 T:1753217904 M:3406819328 WARNING: CDVDMessageQueue(audio)::Get - asked for new data packet, with nothing available
08:20:10 T:1765800816 M:3406819328 WARNING: Previous line repeats 4 times.
08:20:10 T:1765800816 M:3406819328 ERROR: Decode - avcodec_decode_video returned failure
08:20:22 T:2872044400 M:3406860288 ERROR: Previous line repeats 4 times.

This shows as a freeze in playback followed by a return to XBMC menus.

I re-encoded the same title (with the same audio streams and subtitles) from original source material again using 1.7.0, and it played perfectly throughout.

Echoing Mike's previous question, has anyone been able to replicate the problem with 1.7.0?

My 'problem' mkv's were all made with older versions - and I haven't seen it occur with 1.7.0 yet (I've probably encoded approx 30 different BD's since 1.7.0's release).

[forumuser]

I recently extracted some video streams with v1.7.0, the problem still does exist. Again, I was using a DVD as source, not an image file. Going to check a mkv-file created from an iso today/tomorrow

[lotor666]

I am also getting this issue, recently PLEX has been crashing to desktop on occasion when watching MKV's that I have created using MakeMKV, It spans at the very least v 1.70 and 1.71... my older rips dont seem to do that, and I have done at least 150 of them in the past 6 months, it only seems to occur with the v 1.70 series, though I have not tested an earlier one. And the problem is hard to recreate when I want to.

Also I think this issue is fixed when I run it through MKV Merge and make sure header compression is switched off, maybe the process of rewriting the MKV structure fixes it...

I do not think this is a PLEX issue, though it could be both XBMC and PLEX as they are based on the same source code, but I have been running the same version of PLEX for long enough to rule that out, as Make MKV has changed at least 5 versions to only one of PLEX.

[NJPhillips01]

I have now experienced the problem from 1.7.0 through 1.7.2 Some BRs work, some dont. Same with DVDs. Watching with XBMC stops the movie and send me back to the main screen...watching the files with VLC hangs the program altogether...watching with MPC-HC causes a similar error. The only program that is graceful enough to move past the error is Cyberlink PDVD 11... and when it gets to that spot, it freezes for a split second before moving on. I have hundreds (500+) of videos ripped with MakeMKV, translating into hundreds of hours of personal time... now that I am faced with having to dig all my discs back out of the basement and do it over with another program is about ready to cause an aneurysm.

Absolutely unacceptable.

[Romansh]

If you remux one of the files that causes issues in Plex/XBMC/VLC using mkvmerge GUI (from Mkvtoolniux, cross-platform), does it make any difference?

[NJPhillips01]

If you remux one of the files that causes issues in Plex/XBMC/VLC using mkvmerge GUI (from Mkvtoolniux, cross-platform), does it make any difference?

I used MakeMKV because It's easy... If you want give me some directions on how to remux a file I would be more than happy to give it a whirl.

[forumuser]

Hi,

has anyone noticed a change regarding this issue? Haven't tested it for a while and actually its keeping me from buying MakeMkv (and using iso files right now :\ )
Besides this issue it's the best program; just one tool, not various command line tools and countless steps with multiple demuxed files and so on...

[ingen1ous]

Unfortunately I am using version 1.7.6 and I am having this issue as well. I have ripped hundreds of movies, and as far as I know have not had any issues. Granted I have not tested all of them, but I have watched a good sample of them from beginning to end and have not had an issue. TV shows, on the other hand, have given me regular problems. I have had the above described problem with some episodes of the following blu-ray TV series:

Lost
The Universe
Wonders of the Universe
Wonders of the Solar System
Planet Earth
Life
How the Universe Works

The problem is hard to detect because it can happen at anytime during an episode, if it happens at all. I have also had problems with Galapagos and Human Planet, but that is because of a separate, known issue (interlaced VC-1).

Also, as far as I know, the following blu-rays worked without an issue:

Band of Brothers
The Pacific

I have also had nothing but success with standard def DVD TV shows such as:

The Office (U.S.)
Moonlighting
Curb Your Enthusiasm

The consistency of my success makes me believe that standard def DVD TV shows are not an issue. However, high-def blu-ray TV shows give me a problem more often than not.

[mike admin]

Lost
The Universe
Wonders of the Universe
Wonders of the Solar System
Planet Earth
Life
How the Universe Works

I believe these are titles that use VC-1 codec. The open-source implementation of VC-1 is incomplete - it can't handle interlaced video and apparently has spurious issues with some progressive content. I guess in this case your only option is to wait when open-source decoder will be fixed or reencode by yourself with handbrake.