Converting h265 mkv to mp4

[dror.sharon]

Hi everyone!

With 4k movies starting to emerge, I've been wanting to convert some 2160p mkv films to mp4, since that's the only format my TV will play via usb.

In a preHEVC era I used mkv2mp4 and it worked great with all my films, and HandBrake for all my blu rays.
mkv2mp4 doesn't support HEVC though, and Handbrake has no passthrough option that I could find to keep the original quality...

So is there a simple freeware that can do this that has a GUI (preferably) or maybe a simple commandline feature that I can use (take into account that I've never used a command line feature and will probably need a step by step guide).

Or is there a way to add codecs to mkv2mp4 so that it can support HEVC?

Thanx a lot you guys!

[sneaker]

Just use HandBrake. No passthrough feature in the world will ever enable your TV to play HEVC if it doesn't have a HEVC decoder in the first place - it has to be re-encoded.

[dror.sharon]

Just use HandBrake. No passthrough feature in the world will ever enable your TV to play HEVC if it doesn't have a HEVC decoder in the first place - it has to be re-encoded.

Just clearing: the TV supports HEVC codec, but not MKV file type, just MP4. So I need to keep the streams, but change the container to mp4.

Any options out there?

[El Heggunte]

Just use HandBrake. No passthrough feature in the world will ever enable your TV to play HEVC if it doesn't have a HEVC decoder in the first place - it has to be re-encoded.

Just clearing: the TV supports HEVC codec, but not MKV file type, just MP4. So I need to keep the streams, but change the container to mp4.

Any options out there?

You can extract the HEVC elementary stream with mkvextract or TSMuxer, then use MP4Box for wrapping the .hevc file in the MP4 container.

[KarMa]

You can extract the HEVC elementary stream with mkvextract or TSMuxer, then use MP4Box for wrapping the .hevc file in the MP4 container.

May want to use MP4BoxGUI or use MeGUI as the GUI for MP4Box. Otherwise MP4Box is command line. I like the GUI better in MeGUI for this task.

[dror.sharon]

checking it out, will post results soon. Thanx guys!

[dror.sharon]

TsMuxer doesn't seem to work for some reason.
How to I use MKVToolNix to extract streams?

[KarMa]

I think you install MKVToolNix, and then install MKVExtract in the same directory as MKVToolNix as it's just a single .exe. Then just run MKVExtract.

MKVExtract can be found here https://www.videohelp.com/software/MKVExtractGUI-2

[dror.sharon]

Ok, I extracted the streams, but Mp4Box doesn't seem to recognize the HEVC stream, giving an error message that the file contains no video or audio (it's a 4+GB file, so the stream seems to have extracted correctly).

I guess this codec is just too new and nothing completely supports it yet?

[KarMa]

MP4 supported HEVC before MKV did. If you are using MP4BoxGUI then you are using a program which has not been updated in 3 years. Which is why I like MeGUI for MP4 muxing. It handles HEVC fine.

I probably should not have suggested MP4BoxGUI in the first place, for dealing with HEVC.

[sneaker]

You can also try ffmpeg: ffmpeg -i "input.mkv" -map 0 -c copy "output.mp4"

[V1de0Luvr]

As long as FFmpeg works, my PowerShell script could easily be changed to pass thru HEVC instead of re-encoding it. Just remove "HEVC" from the $HandbrakeFormats array at the top and add to the $FFmpegFormats array above it - https://forum.videohelp.com/threads/379314-Convert-Videos-for-Playing-on-Chromecast-PowerShell-script

[dror.sharon]

MP4 supported HEVC before MKV did. If you are using MP4BoxGUI then you are using a program which has not been updated in 3 years. Which is why I like MeGUI for MP4 muxing. It handles HEVC fine.

I probably should not have suggested MP4BoxGUI in the first place, for dealing with HEVC.

Well it worked perfectly!
Thanx!

[Erik84750]

Hi, I found this thread because I hava mkv video files that cannot be played on my hardware mediaplayer attached to my tv set.

I downloaded and installed both Handbrake and the set of MKVExtractGUI-2.3.0.0, My MP4Box GUI 0.6.0.6, MeGUI_2624_x86.

First I tried Handbrake (standard settings, I did not change any options): in no time the conversion was done but I have the impression that the video quality is not optimal.

Then I tried MeGUI 2624: it took about a half hour to convert an hour worth of video; there was no mention of HVEC, but then I may not fully understand how this software works. Is there a recommended "user's guide", or "must-have-read" for this software? Any input is greatly appreciated!
Erik

[Erik84750]

After conversion of the mkv with MeGUI I now have a _track2_und file, a _track1_und.srt and a _track3_eng.aac file and a new mkv file. How do I convert this to mp4?

Edit: I think I found it: there is a dialog box for file conversion, I checked video output tab, and there only mkv was selected; I changed that to mp4. Correct?