Subtitles for the WD and Seagate players--How??

[tony55]

What a dilemma. .ts and .m2ts rips will give me subtitles on both the WD and Seagate player without doing anything special to get them. Problem with the .ts m2ts rips is no chapters. Doesn't seem to be a way around that.

So, mkv.
Makemkv has a problem with some BR rips and not passing thru the chapters. Mike the admin indicated that the next version would fix that problem. Even if its not, other programs will insert the chapters so one way or another all my mkvs will have chapters. However, even after reading all the topics re: how to get my mkvs to play subtitles so far nothing doing.

I've converted the PGS to srt ,sup and idx with no positive results so far. If tsmuxer includes the new subtitles, Make mkv wont turn the resulting file into a mkv. I've used BDSUPtoSub and suprip1.16 any other suggestions for software?
Finally I did get a mkv with srt and idx subs loaded with mkv merge and the Seagate just locked up.

I haven't given up yet, but the process to subtitle a mkv for playback on my above listed players seems to be as elusive as chaptering a .ts file.

Any additional advice?

Tony

[setarip_old]

Hi!

Just as a point of information, member "Justin Chase" indicated that he successfully played back such files (including subtitles) using "J River Media Center"...

[tony55]

@setarip_old
Yes indeed. I did read that and I'm going back to retry it again later tonight. I've just been adding subtitles and trying to see if one of them will stick. Now I will go back to do it with only one subtitle at a time. Your question in a previous post also is on my mind asking about why pgs subtitles can't be read by files in the mkv container. I've yet to see a BR that had anything other than pgs subs so why can't they fix the container. My devices will play pgs subs so going thru all these gyrations to find a different kind of sub that will play in a mkv container just seems like an ass backwards way of doing it.

The advantage of Makemkv is that with little or no effort and with a minimum amount of time it will rip and convert a BR to something that has chapters makes it extremely useful. If you than have to begin finagling to stick a sub in, than that definitely takes away from the programs usefulness. I will keep working at changing the pgs to something my Seagate will play but truthfully, it's just not worth the effort to do it continually.

As much as I'd like to get subs on my mkv, I can live without them. Like you though I would like to know why Matroska.org hasn't fixed or addressed it yet.

Tony

[tony55]

Well, I was able to put subtitles into a mkv that would play on my Seagate player. I ended up using suprip and using mkvmerge I was able to using demuxed BR files and only the srt to get subtitles. Needless to say, I did everything without using Makemkv and needless to also say that after going thru all that trouble, I wont be doing it again. Before I go thru all that trouble, I'll pull out the original disk and play that on my PS3.

Until this subtitle problem is fixed the right way, I'll be using makemkv and I'll be ending up with mkvs w/o subtitles.

Tony

[Danger]

This is actually pretty simple, not sure what all the hoopla is about.

---- RIPPING ----

Use CloneBD to rip the files you will need, you will most likely need AnyDVD HD:
- set DEMUX folder, mine is "Y:\ClownBD Demux"
- Uncheck "Remux Location (txMuxeR output)" if it is checked
- Uncheck "Use ImgBurn" if it is checked
- click NEXT

Select the stream you want, usually the first one but not always.
- click NEXT

Check off the streams you want:
- Chapters, Video, Audio, Subtitles (english is usually the first one)
- Select AC3 if you wish to convert the HD Audio to AC3 otherwise check "unconverted"
- Click NEXT
---- wait till it finishes, it should just close itself down when finished.

---- CONVERTING SUBTITLES ----

Now run "BDSup2Sub"
- File -> Load -> I'm going to point it to "Y:\ClownBD Demux" and look for a file that looks something like
"Subtitles_9_English.sup"
- Let it do it's thing, click any OK buttons when they show up, when it's finished loading go
- File -> Save/Export -> Click SAVE
- Close BDSup2Sub

---- CREATING THE MKV FILE WITH SUBTITLES & CHAPTERS ----

Run MKVMerge GUI
- click "add" again point it to your demux folder (mine is Y:\ClownBD Demux)
- "add" Video_#.h264 (note: a warning will pop up about frame rate, ignore it for now)
- "add" Audio_#_Language.AC3 (where # is a number & Language is a language such as
English & if you converted the audio to AC3)
- if you didn't convert the audio then "add" Audio_#_Language.DTS (ie.Audio_3_English.DTS)
- "add" your subtitles, in my case file "Subtitles_9_English_exp.idx"
- Now we need to fix the frame rate, which should be 23.976 so click on the video
stream and then click on the tab "Format specific options" and in the box next to
FPS: type in 23.976 (very very VERY important, you will have A/V synch issues otherwise)
- one thing left to do, add in chapters: Click on the "Global" tab and under Chapters ->
Chapter File: -> click Browse and select "Chapters_1.txt"
---- Now you are all set up, click the button "Start Muxing"

Assuming no errors, you will get an MKV file with chapters and subtitles.

Yes it does seem like a lot of work but actually after a couple times it gets really easy and
the programs, other than AnyDVD HD, are free. At least you now have more information
about the process than when I started out. This isn't to take away from MakeMKV, I really
like the program, it's made converting my DVD's a breeze and for that along I will probably
buy it just to support the author. If it could do for me what I have done above then well
I wouldn't have written this. Hopefully in the future it will do all of this. In the mean time
there are alternatives.

If there is interest I may put that above steps in PDF format with screenshots of the actual
programs.

[setarip_old]

@Danger

Hi!

Although I'm sure you're post is well intentioned, if you'd read the following thread, I'm sure you'd realize that you're proposing nothing new - other than the wholly unnecessary use of SlySoft-related programs/tools:

http://www.makemkv.com/forum2/viewtopic.php?f=1&t=808

not sure what all the hoopla is about.

Again, if you'd read that thread, you'd see there's NO "hoopla" about the procedures required. The problem appears to be that many of the newer hardware playback systems will not display subtitles of that format (Apparently any PGS/SUP bitmap-based subtitles)as part of an .MKV "package".

[tony55]

@Danger

The problem appears to be that many of the newer hardware playback systems will not display subtitles of that format (Apparently any PGS/SUP bitmap-based subtitles)as part of an .MKV "package".

As I indicated earlier it's too much effort and time consuming for me to go thru the gyrations to get the subs.

I do appreciate Dangers post. I gives me a better understanding of the process. But, since Makemkv works so well as a ripper and gives me most of what I want without any effort I'll keep using it and just not worry about the subs.

But since you (setarip_old) indicated "many of the newer hardware players.... " I was wondering if you knew of any players that would play MKV PGS subs?

I'm surprised that neither of the players that I have, have bothered to upgrade their buggy 'beta' software.


Tony

[setarip_old]

@tony55

But since you (setarip_old) indicated "many of the newer hardware players.... " I was wondering if you knew of any players that would play MKV PGS subs?

No, I don't - But I'd guess that, with the PGS subtitle format being so intimately related to BluRay and MKV gaining in usage, it may be a relatively short period of time (perhaps before the next Christmas season) that it becomes relatively commonplace...

[MilesAhead]

Tony I have the 1st generation WD HDTV player for USB. There's only 2 ways I can be sure to see subs with .mkv or .m2ts files. 1) burn them into the video or 2) convert to .srt and include the file with the video file with the same base filename. Often I can play .srt subs that are a stream in an .mkv, but it's not stable and more prone to going out of sync. I've found generally the WD player doesn't like .mkv that much. I use tsMuxer to get an .m2ts with a single AC3 audio track and copy the .srt sub as an external file in the same folder.

See the other thread about extracting PGS subs for my "lazy mans's way" of getting the .srt without any manual OCR work:

http://www.makemkv.com/forum2/viewtopic ... t=15#p3487

[Danger]

I also have a WD HD TV Media Player Gen1, my above method for making
an mkv with chapters & subs works and plays just fine for me.

[MilesAhead]

I also have a WD HD TV Media Player Gen1, my above method for making
an mkv with chapters & subs works and plays just fine for me.

What drive are you playing from? I'm using a USB 2.0 docking station. Don't know if it matters as when hooked up to my PC I read from it at 24 MB/sec. What happens when you hit FF? Or do you? I'm just trying to find out because after a bunch of hangs, out of sync issues, I just try to give it the minimum so it doesn't choke.

I updated to the latest firmware. Seems to have improved the menus a bit is all I can detect. I think it did play one idx/sub subtitle, the next try not.. so I stick with .srt or burned in.

[Danger]

I have several drives I play off of. My main one is a 2T WD External but I also use a 64G Corsair Flash Drive when I just want to do up a movie and just watch it (later moving it permanently to the WD Drive) & currently testing out a Thermaltake Duet Docking Station although I haven't given it much testing yet. I have been getting some glitches with the BR movies I've done where the audio cuts out but the movie still plays but this only happens an some of the movies and in the same spot in that movie. If I turn off the WD Player and turn it back on, the movie will play fine again where I left off. The WD Drive was in bad need of defragmenting (18% fragmented) which I am currently doing, which is what I suspect was the causing the glitching, will know once it's all done.

I would have to do further testing once the drive is finished defragging but I do know that I could FF/RW without it hanging up.
Actually I find using the MKV container I can FF/RW better than I could with AVI or MP4 that I was using previous to finding MakeMKV.

Again for subtitles I will need to actually test each BR I have done to see for sure but I do know that most of them play the subtitles as they should be.