External Blu‑ray drive not recognized on Arch Linux with MakeMKV 1.18.x – makemkvcon becomes zombie

[dicek]

Hello,

I am running MakeMKV 1.18.1 on an Arch‑based Linux distribution (kernel 6.x) with an external Blu‑ray drive (BRXL-PTV6U3-RDB [USB-A]) and an internal DVD drive. My user is in the optical/cdrom group, and the `sg` kernel module is loaded automatically.

**Issue**

- When I insert a Blu‑ray disc into the external drive and launch MakeMKV, the GUI shows “Opening disc…” but never proceeds. The `makemkvcon` process becomes a zombie and must be killed manually.
- Strangely, if I first insert a DVD into my internal DVD drive, allow MakeMKV to scan that disc, eject it, and then insert the Blu‑ray disc into the external drive, MakeMKV reads the Blu‑ray normally.

**Troubleshooting steps**
- Loaded the `sg` module via `sudo modprobe sg` and added it to `/etc/modules-load.d/sg.conf`:contentReference[oaicite:3]{index=3}. Confirmed `/dev/sg*` devices exist. Despite this, the problem persists.
- Tried both the AUR version and the official binary of MakeMKV 1.18.1; both exhibit the same behaviour.
- Verified that udev lists the drives correctly and that the drives function normally with other software (e.g., VLC can mount the disc).
- Running `makemkvcon info /dev/sr0 --debug=/tmp/makemkv_debug.txt` hangs with no output; the process becomes defunct.

**Expected behaviour**
MakeMKV should be able to detect and parse a Blu‑ray disc from the external drive without requiring a second optical drive or a preliminary DVD scan.

If you need additional debug logs or more system details, please let me know. I appreciate any guidance on resolving this issue or confirming whether it is a bug in MakeMKV 1.18.1.

Thank you.

[wmcclain]

See this thread: viewtopic.php?f=3&t=37670

You have to install an earlier version for now. Works for me on Arch.

[dicek]

Thanks for pointing me to that thread.

I learned from it that recent MakeMKV releases (1.18.x) have a bug on Linux that causes the Blu‑ray scan to hang, even when the sg module is loaded.

Downgrading to version 1.17.7, as you suggested, immediately fixed the issue and my external drive works normally again.

It appears this is a MakeMKV problem, not an Arch-specific one.
I appreciate the help and look forward to a proper fix in a future release.