Please Help A Noob

[XrayDoc88]

I've just recently decided that I'd like to put my DVD and Blu-ray collection on my NAS. The majority of the viewing will be done in a high end theater. I want to keep the native video quality and the best audio track quality unchanged. I don't plan on transcoding to decrease file size. I also want the "forced" subtitles to be always be present. It might be nice to have all English subtitles as on option however. I plan on playing the MKV file using VLC or PLEX. I have a few questions.

1. In MakeMKV should "decrypt video" be checked or unchecked? The default seems to be unchecked. What does that mean for future playback?
2. If I added all of the subtitles to the MKV file, will they automatically be shown when playing the file with VLC or PLEX? Or can you still toggle them on or off?
3. How much extra space do English subtitles typically add to the MKV file for a 2 hour movie?
4. Should I include any lesser quality audio tracks (like Dolby Digital or DTS or even stereo) for possible playback on a smaller device? Or would a future transcode or streaming of the original MKV file create these lower quality tracks on the fly? I'm not sure how streaming would work from my NAS to my cell phone for example. I certainly don't need the 7.1 soundtrack in that example.

Feel free to make alternate suggestions if I'm clueless.

[yorgo]

Hi, and welcome to MakeMKV.

1. The "decrypt video" choice is for backing up the entire contents of a BD or DVD disc exactly as they are laid out on the disc using folder structures, etc., and either having the backup copy include the encryption or not (helpful for exactly duplicating the contents, or for testing purposes, probably for other reasons as well). If you make a .mkv file of the contents of a disc (pressing the "disc" button in the upper left corner of the program after the disc has been de-encrypted), the end file does not include encryption.

2. MakeMKV will save whichever subtitles you check off. Depending on your playback software, you can select which subtitle track to listen to and to toggle subtitles on/off.

3. Subtitles make up a tiny portion of the file. I'd say almost negligible.

4. Your choice but I keep the "core" audio files just in case. I've experienced incompatibility with high-resolution audio and some hardware players in the past, easier just to keep but it does take up more storage space.

Regarding forced subtitles, I always check to include but find they rarely actually exist. Then again, I almost always watch all programming with main subtitles turned on.

[XrayDoc88]

So do I understand this correctly?

1. "Decrypt video" only really applies if you're creating a complete backup of a disc with all the contents intact? In that case you can choose whether to have encryption left in place or removed from the backup?
2. When you're only choosing certain "titles" to copy from a Blu-ray disc (eliminating foreign languages for example), the resulting MKV file always has the encryption removed?

Thanks!

[yorgo]

Yes and yes.

[XrayDoc88]

Thank you yorgo. Perhaps you understand two other questions I have?

1. When ripping a Blu-ray movie I noticed that there were quite a few entries in the log that said something like "Title 0019.m2ts was only 114 secs long which is less than the 120 sec minimum and therefore was skipped." I know the 120 second setting can be changed, but what are these titles that are being skipped? When we choose the main movie title and customize audio tracks, etc. don't we want everything to get ripped? How can you discard over a minute of the movie without it having some noticeable effect?
2. When looking at the various audio options in the main movie I saw a checkbox for 7.1 True HD that also had a sub checkbox for DD 5.1. But then there was also another checkbox at the same hierarchy as the 7.1 True HD that said DD 5.1. Why would there be two DD 5.1 tracks in the same movie title?

[yorgo]

1. The tracks that MakeMKV shows are the tracks that have been authored onto the disc. Some are obvious, like the large one(s) that have contain the movie or TV show. Others are the disc's extras, such as trailers, interviews, etc., as well as housekeeping stuff like the copyright warnings and main menu. Then there's the odd stuff like segments of the movie (common for seamless branching discs), duplicate titles (why? who knows...), and very short completely blank titles (presumably for some internal reasons). And we won't get into Lionsgate movies with their playlist obfuscation and Disney's multiple-language titles (google or search the site for more info).

What to set the limit to depends on what tracks you want to have MakeMKV pick up and wrap. I prefer to keep most or all of the extras so I set it to 15 seconds, which keeps most of the junk away but saves short deleted scenes or TV spots. I'm sure others set it higher in order to only capture the main movie. This is a preferential setting, though I wouldn't recommend setting to something ridiculous like 7200 -- ie, 2 hours -- or higher.

MakeMKV will not discard any sections within a title so if you select the main title/track at least (ie, movie), the entire title/track will be saved. Nothing gets cut.

2. The DD5.1 track directly under the TrueHD track is the "core" audio track (see here for more info: https://forum.videohelp.com/threads/374 ... D-AC3-Core). Sometimes, another DD5.1 track is laid down, probably in order to list it as an option in the main BD menu but, again, it's up to the author how they want to master the disc.

[preserve]

Just to add to what yorgo already stated, a separate 5.1 track might be an original legacy or theatrical mix while the 7.1 track (in this example) is a new mix. In that case that original 5.1 mix is a different mix than the core portion from another track. Additional 5.1 tracks of the same language can also be commentary or descriptive audio tracks - the descriptive audio tracks especially tend to be 5.1, while commentary tracks tend to be just stereo.

Since yorgo mentioned Disney, I'll add that explanation in brief: if it's a Disney disc, 99% of the time you want playlist 800 for the main movie in English. Then you'll get 801, 802, etc - those playlist numbers will be used for other languages (generally French and Spanish), where Disney uses different video segments in order to show different languages for the credits as well as any signs that appear in the movie. (I say 99% of the time because some older discs might be something like 100, 101, 102, etc.)