audio dropouts on standalone player w/2.0 (1.5 was ok)

[phxphun1]

Ok... First off I want to say nice program... Automates and greatly speeds and simplifies the process of "upgrading" a vcd collection to DVD.

I first tried 1.5. The movies played fine, (pc with PowerDVD and two different standalone players), sound was perfect. The menu didn't work, though, on one of the players.

SO... I figure I'll try 2.0rc5. Very nice improvement to the UI. This time the menu worked better (bottom fourth of the screen black, but I can work around that) on the "problem" player, and still worked on the other player and the pc. But now there is a new problem... Every 5 or ten seconds the sound drops out for a fraction of a second, only on one of my players (Cinevision/GoVideo RV4000). This happens consistently throughout the entire movie, all four movies on the disc. This did not happen with 1.5 even on this player.

Background info - source material was homemade VCDs, ripped with isobuster using the "treat as video" option, saved as mpg files. I used the same fileset for my 1.5 and 2.0 attempts with svcd2dvd. Both tumes I let svcd2dvd create the video_ts fileset, which I burned myself with Nero. The problem is not likely to be my burner or media because I haven't had this audio issue before, and in fact the disc I made with 1.5 had no audio problem.

I'd appreciate any help with this; it's a nice program (so nice I already payd for it but I'd like its dvds to be compatible with my GoVideo combo as it is my primary player.

[phxphun1]

I'm thinking it must have something to do with the audio resampling... what has changed about that between the two versions? Like I said, I used the exact same source files for both attempts.

Also FWIW, I tried both the MPEG and AC3 audio options, with the same results. FWIW, It seems that the resulting audio on the DVDs was MPEG even when I chose AC3 on the settings page.

[phxphun1]

OK... it gets stranger. There's something this standalone player doesn't like going on with SVCD2DVD. This time I tried with the "skip resample" option. Similar results, except interestingly the menu is perfect this time (instead of the bottom third being blank). Cool. Not sure why that changed when I chose a different audio option, but...? Unfortunately, the audio still hiccups, tho this time it is irregular and unpredictable. Before it was happening at fairly regular intervals. Again, it's only one particular set-top player that has the problem... the same disc plays in other players OK. But the same player will play other DVD's that I've made with the same burner and media with no problem.

[phxphun1]

ChrissyBoy... have you seen this? Just wondering because I posted it a week ago but you've not commented, and you've answered more recent posts. Perhaps you have seen it, and are still trying to figure it out? Have I supplied insufficient information for you to try to help? Let me know what else you need to know, or what else I should try first. Or has my plea for product support just accidentally slipped between the cracks and you missed it?

[ChrissyBoy]

I missed it. Sorry....

In the first instance lets deal with the audio dropouts. Can you send me your log file and a sample of an mpeg which is giving the issue (use makesample: should be straight forward to use. See if you can get a sample which replicates the problem). Please send me an email with those.

Just to be clear: audio fine on some standalones and PC but not on the one DVD player? Is this correct?

[phxphun1]

"Just to be clear: audio fine on some standalones and PC but not on the one DVD player? Is this correct?"

Exactly. Shall I time the dropouts to see if they are regular or random? They do seem to be somewhat regular.

OK... I'll do a run with a small source file and assuming it misbehaves I'll send along the source file and log. Thanks!

[phxphun1]

Chrissy - were the logs and samples I sent able to give you any clue as to what's going on here? I'm sure it is not your top priority as I seem to be the only one having this problem; I do appreciate all the work you've put into this software.

[ChrissyBoy]

I have taken a few looks at this problem but must admit to not getting too far with it. (i can't replicated the issue). The only thing that could be the issue is the fact that the sample is mpeg1. Have you experience the same with mpeg2 sources?

[phxphun1]

No, I haven't, actually. I'll try that and see what happens. Remember, though, that I don't have this audio problem with 1.5 - what has changed in the way audio streams are handled between 1.5 and 2.0? If I had to take a wild guess, I'd say something to do with the remux step?

It's just so odd because it seems to be just this one player, but at the same time, I've had no problems on this player with any other discs, including ones I've made with other conversion/authoring tools and DVDs made on various set-top recorders.

[ChrissyBoy]

Well the muxing has changed. resampling has not (if you were using ffmpeg on v1.5). I personally have not done much testing with mpeg1 sources.

If it still happens with mpeg2 then i can rustle up some test files for you to try to see if we can home in on the single step which is causing the issue.

CB

[phxphun1]

Thanks... I'll try some MPEG2 and get back to you with the result.

- Mike