mkvmerge - terminator sarah connor chronicles - bafflement

[squeedle]

Hi gang. First time poster here.

I've been ripping my entire DVD/BD collection to MKV (H265) for storage on my NAS. Several hundred titles in, I've run into the first problem I haven't been able to solve.

The source is the blu-ray set of "Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles". The way this bd is authored, the first episode appears twice on the disc: once with the normal AC3 5.1 surround track, and another time with an AC3 2.0 commentary track.

What I'd like to do is wind up with a single MKV of this episode, with BOTH audio tracks on it. Seems pretty simple.

I've tried using MKVMerge (MKVToolNix), but no matter what I do, it won't merge everything. It either says unsupported format, or parameters do not match, or something.

I've tried demuxing the sources into their various components: a single video stream, and 2 ac3 streams (i've also tried converting the audio to WAV and to mka). No luck.

What am I doing wrong here?

[netmask56]

You don't use the 'merge' command - simply add the second track along with the video. On you media player simply select the audio track you want.


so a MediaInfo report would look like this

Video
ID : 4113 (0x1011)
Menu ID : 1 (0x1)
Format : AVC
Format/Info : Advanced Video Codec
Format profile : High@L4.1
Format settings, CABAC : Yes
Format settings, ReFrames : 2 frames
Codec ID : 27
Duration : 1h 58mn
Bit rate mode : Variable
Bit rate : 39.6 Mbps
Width : 1 920 pixels
Height : 1 080 pixels
Display aspect ratio : 16:9
Frame rate : 23.976 (24000/1001) fps
Color space : YUV
Chroma subsampling : 4:2:0
Bit depth : 8 bits
Scan type : Progressive
Bits/(Pixel*Frame) : 0.797
Stream size : 32.7 GiB (93%)

Audio #1
ID : 4352 (0x1100)
Menu ID : 1 (0x1)
Format : TrueHD / AC-3
Mode extension : CM (complete main)
Format settings, Endianness : Big
Muxing mode : Stream extension
Codec ID : 131
Duration : 1h 58mn
Bit rate mode : Variable / Constant
Bit rate : 640 Kbps
Maximum bit rate : 4 701 Kbps
Channel(s) : 6 channels
Channel positions : Front: L C R, Side: L R, LFE
Sampling rate : 48.0 KHz
Frame rate : 31.250 fps (1536 spf)
Delay relative to video : -1ms
Stream size : 542 MiB (2%)

Audio #2
ID : 4353 (0x1101)
Menu ID : 1 (0x1)
Format : AC-3
Format/Info : Audio Coding 3
Mode extension : CM (complete main)
Format settings, Endianness : Big
Codec ID : 129
Duration : 1h 58mn
Bit rate mode : Constant
Bit rate : 640 Kbps
Channel(s) : 6 channels
Channel positions : Front: L C R, Side: L R, LFE
Sampling rate : 48.0 KHz
Frame rate : 31.250 fps (1536 spf)
Compression mode : Lossy
Stream size : 542 MiB (2%)

Text #1
ID : 4608 (0x1200)
Menu ID : 1 (0x1)
Format : PGS
Codec ID : 144

Text #2
ID : 4609 (0x1201)
Menu ID : 1 (0x1)
Format : PGS
Codec ID : 144

[Wizard23]

nervmind cause i forgot about what netmask56 said. So my post wasn't needed.

[squeedle]

Not sure if I'm misunderstanding, or if my original post wasn't clear. But these are two completely separate titles on the disc. Each only has one audio track. So there has to be some type of "append"/merge to accomplish what I'm trying to do...right?

[ConverterCrazy]

I think
you can try converting the original video with Handbrake.

Under Audio tab select both tracks or all audio tracks of the language of choice and save as MKV.

Play the new video – choosing each track to see you got what you wanted.

If not, post error messages and MediaInfo here, so that someone can answer your question.

[sneaker]

Not sure if I'm misunderstanding, or if my original post wasn't clear. But these are two completely separate titles on the disc. Each only has one audio track. So there has to be some type of "append"/merge to accomplish what I'm trying to do...right?

"Appending" in mkvmerge means that the input files will be appended sequentially. So if you have two 30 minute files and you choose "append" you will end up with one 60 minute file. If you want to have one 30 minute file but with multiple tracks you choose "Add". I'm still not sure what exactly it is that you want. Note that when you want to "append" mkvmerge might error out or display warnings if the streams aren't compatible (e.g. both videos same resolution, audio with same number of channels etc.)

[netmask56]

The source is the blu-ray set of "Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles". The way this bd is authored, the first episode appears twice on the disc: once with the normal AC3 5.1 surround track, and another time with an AC3 2.0 commentary track.

As you said the same episode - so are you now saying the 'second' version with commentary has different video content? Can you clarify what you mean?

[netmask56]

Follow Up: So by what means are you establishing there are 2 instances of the first episode? What you might be seeing is a pointer to the one and only video, one selecting full sound track and the other the commentary or after ripping to hdd are there actually 2 video files with their unique sound track?

[squeedle]

@netmask: Yes, there are actually 2 TOTALLY SEPARATE video files on the disc, each with its own unique soundtrack. One has ONLY 5.1 channel normal soundtrack, one has ONLY 2.0 channel commentary. The video appears to be identical on both tracks, exact same runtime, etc. It is VERY STRANGE, but it's true.

@convertercrazy: See above.

@sneaker: Wow, I'm a moron. This was the problem. I was using "append" when I should have been using "add". Durrr...egg on face. Thank you.

[netmask56]

If the video is identical in both than rather than clutter your NAS with and additional and unnecessary file you could just put both soundtracks on the one MKV file and then select which one you want for playback. If you made one of them FORCED then that would be the default arrangement. A MKV file can have many soundtracks as well as numerous subtitle tracks. But only one video file.