Bad/Invalid public movie atom - HD-DVD --> MP4

[dacookster]

OK,

I've seen this topic come up all over the internet and I have found no solution anywhere (that works). I've followed the guide on here to backup Blu-ray and HD-DVD and have found no success backing up HD-DVD EVO files to H.264. I'm using evodemux, avisynth, megui. The files play fine in media players BUT ALWAYS return "Error 2002: bad public movie atom" when trying to play them in quicktime. My goal is to add these backups to Itunes to be played on my AppleTV. I've been in the game since the first DVD-ROM drives came out so I know a little bit about what I'm doing. Has anyone overcome or encountered this issue with any success - please help!!!!!!!!

[Midzuki]

Do you mean, H264 in MP4 container?
If so, have you already tried Nic's mp4box?

Anyway, let me plagiarise Alexander Noe:

QuickTime, iTunes and iPod do not support MP4, don't use them

[jman98]

For thorny HD conversion issues, I advise checking out the forums at http://www.doom9.net as they have some really heavy duty people there. The guys who wrote the original BluRay and HD DVD decryption tools hang out there. Your problem may be specific to Quicktime in that what you are doing is fine, but maybe for playback on AppleTV you need to do specific things that you don't know to do.

Lots of other people are reporting this error (I did a quick search on Google), but they seem to be having it with Divx, not H.264. Try to find out what AppleTV requires because I have read that it won't play just anything.

[dacookster]

Thanks for the response guys. If you can add a movie to Itunes, it will play on the apple tv. I've was using Handbrake on a mac for dvd's until I got a Blu-ray/HD-DVD combo drive. Whats bizarre is that if I make encode a portion of the movie using the trim method in avisynth, everything works fine. It's only when I remove the trim function from the script and try to encode the whole file that this problem occurs.

[poisondeathray]

Compatibility for "Apple" related devices and players is weak. You have to turn down the settings for your encodes.

For AppleTV you need AVC Main @ Level 3.1 (or lower), no mixed ref. frames, No CABAC, 1 reference frame, Max 3B-frames (to be safe I would only use 1), No B-pyramids, No I8x8

For QT in Windows you need AVC Main, Max 1B-frame (although I have had up to 3 play), No B-pyramids, No I8x8

MeGUI and Ripbot264 have preset profiles if you want. I don't have AppleTV but I can confirm the settings work for QT in Windows.

[dacookster]

Thanks poisondeathray!! I will confirm and adjust the settings as per your info and see if I can't make things happen. I may just have to give up on HD-DVD and use Blu-ray. Too bad cause I own about 30 HD-DVD titles and it would be nice to back them up.

[dacookster]

Got it - here's what I did:

-Demux tracks from .evo with evodemux
-Used TSmuxer to remux into .m2ts file
-using MeGUI, create avs file with .m2ts file
-Resolution - 1280xwhatever with a other settings yadayada...
-bitrate 4000kbps
-x264 profile setup as poisondeathray's suggestions and the PD-Apple TV profile
-produce raw .264 file
-mux multichannel AAC audio with Yamb or MeGUI MP4 muxer

Plays perfect in quicktime and Itunes, and even better, looks and plays awesome, streamed to an AppleTV - even over wifi.

Thanks for all your help!!

[mannox]

Do you mean, H264 in MP4 container?
If so, have you already tried Nic's mp4box?

Anyway, let me plagiarise Alexander Noe:

QuickTime, iTunes and iPod do not support MP4, don't use them

IF you have the files saved on an external drive (or even if they were at ANY point saved on an external drive), go to your manuf's website and download the latest firmware upgrade for that external drive. Worked for me and solved ALL my .dmg issues, ALL my public movie atom issues, and all my "Error 4960" issues.

If the files became "corrupt" at some point (while they were on an external drive) - copying them to another location would only be making copies of broken files. You have to go back to the drive (hopefully they are still there). Keeping the files ON the drive, update the firmware. Everything came back for me, instantly. Whew!

mannox@gmail.com