Replacing DTS audio and reauthoring.

[astrocity20]

I want to replace this DTS audio I have on a DVD with a ac3 cause well... the DTS doesn't work. But I also want to keep all the original menus in place. Any sure fire way to do that?

[manono]

Hi-

Demux the movie with PGCDemux. Reauthor using Muxman, leaving out the DTS track. Use the Replace button in VobBlanker to get the movie back into the original DVD, keeping the menus.

[Noahtuck]

I want to replace this DTS audio I have on a DVD with a ac3 cause well... the DTS doesn't work. But I also want to keep all the original menus in place. Any sure fire way to do that?

The DTS does not "work" or your system will not play DTS ?
And do you have the ac3 audio already or do you need to make it or want to convert the dts audio to ac3 ?

[manono]

Reading it again, he is a little unclear, isn't he Noahtuck? I took it to mean that he doesn't have a receiver to decode the DTS, and that there's also AC3 already on the DVD. So he wants to remove the DTS, perhaps to make the DVD smaller and easier to compress. I can see now how it could be interpreted in other ways, including maybe creating AC3 from the DTS.

[Noahtuck]

Yep, I assumed he does not have the ac3 (or on the dvd) and made a disc with just DTS because he stated he wanted to replace the DTS with AC3.
I was just asking/adding a little more to your reply and his question to try to clarify, because if he only has the DTS he has some more converting to do.

[manono]

And if you're correct, then we're on shaky legal ground because no retail DVD comes with DTS only. The answer would have to be for the OP to go back to his retail DVD and grab the AC3 audio.

Converting DTS to AC3 can be tricky. As I understand it, you have to have the DTS decoder from WinDVD Platinum before you can do it. I've done it a few times with WinDVD Platinum installed, creating the 6 Mono WAV files using BeSweet, and then using Soft Encode for the job. Maybe there are other ways now.

Azidts can be used to transcode DTS with BeSweet (Note that you'll need WinDVD Platinum installed) or with one of the BeSweet GUIs (eg. OagMachine).

http://forum.doom9.org/showthread.php?s=&threadid=68300#post424069

[Noahtuck]

well, as for the first part, i don't assume anything. 8)
As i have dvd's that have DTS as the first audio track which by standards are not, but i dont worry about it because everyone of the 5 systems in my home will play DTS.
Just like as soon as someone say's the word "Downloaded" the (Beep) come a flocking

For the rest, i never said it would be easy or cheap :P
I usualy use a variety of tools for working with, mixing and making DTS & 5.1 audio tracks like Adobe Audition, SurCode, a few other's, but they are not cheap!!
As far as i know the cheapest DTS encoder from them is $500.00.
But you can extract a DTS audio track to 6 mono wavs and then re-encode them to ac3 5.1.
I'm sure there are alot of way's to acomplish this but i don't use bewseet or any of that other stuff as i always hated farting around with it, but if you don't want to pay for or can afford those other's i guess it's read read read & practice practice practice

[astrocity20]

Yeah I don't have a DTS decoder on any of my dvd players. And I need to convert to DTS over to ac3... which is a separate problem in itself but one I can do I'm pretty sure. Main problem is getting all the menus and stuff to work and inputting the new audio in place of the DTS.

[manono]

Hi-

Looks like you were right Noahtuck. Thanks for setting me straight.

OK, after you've gotten the DTS converted to AC3, follow my instructions in my first post, making sure to also check "Demux Video Stream" in PGCDemux, as it isn't checked by default, Instead of leaving out the DTS, you'll be replacing it with your new AC3 track when reauthoring with Muxman. You add the chapters by going File->Import Chapter and loading the Celltimes.txt. Also load the Video, new AC3 Audio, and the Subs, if any. You'll keep the menus and everything else when you replace your old Movie DVD with the newly authored one in VobBlanker.

[astrocity20]

hm, well I'm with you all the way up to the vobblanker part. I replaced the pgc with the newly authored muxman vob... it gave me something about "how the audio streams are different do you want to correct this"... I tried pressing yes once and no once but got the same thing... That being everything works perfectly... the Video, the subs... but no audio shows up at all. It's completely mute. I know the ac3 is good because the thing I used on muxman plays fine. Any clue as to what I need to do. I'm almost there :P just a little more and it'll be perfect.

[manono]

Yes, you're almost there. And you want to click yes to the message, but it doesn't make a whole lot of difference. The fact that the Muxman authored DVD plays with audio and the VobBlanker replaced one doesn't just means that you have to remap the audio stream. How are you testing it, in PowerDVD? While playing, right-click on the video and check how many audio streams are listed. My guess is that there are 2 (or more, maybe greyed out), and it's playing the second one, left over from when the DTS was the second audio stream in the original retail DVD.

Open the final DVD in PGCEdit. Double-click on the movie. You'll know it by its length in the left part of the screen. You'll see "Audio Streams" in the top center of the new screen that opens up. What you do next depends on what you see, and you might have to play around and test. If you screw up, PGCEdit automatically saves the original IFOs, so you replace them if you mess up, delete the PGCEdit_backup folder, and start over again by reopening the DVD.

I'm pretty sure that it's set up to play Stream 1 or maybe 2 (the second or third of the original retail DVD audio streams), whereas after Muxman you've made your new AC3 track the first audio stream (stream 0). So, check the audio streams that say something besides "none". If one of them is the DTS track, then click on stream 0 and and remap it to the DTS track. That is, move the slider to whatever stream number the DTS used to be, and hit "Set". To help find which used to be the DTS track, in the lower left corner, hit "current domain stream attributes" and check. Disable any other streams by clicking on them and hitting "Disable" and you'll see how it changes from a stream number to "none". When done, Stream "0" will say maybe "1" or "2", and all the others will say "none". Hit "OK" and File->Save DVD in the top left of the original screen.

If that doesn't fix it, you may have to play around and test other possibilities, but you've gotten this far, so I'm confident you'll get it. Good luck.

[manono]

Thinking about it some more; if remapping the Stream zero to whatever stream number the DTS track was before doesn't work, then just turning on the Stream zero by hitting "Set" and leaving it at "0" may fix it. That assumes it was "none" before. So, instead of remapping the audio stream, fixing it may be as simple as turning on the stream.

There are several ways it may be set up, and you may have to try out a number of different things to get your new audio to work. Making a change and saving it and then testing in PowerDVD doesn't take long at all though. So it's easy to try out a number of different combinations in a short time.

[jman98]

While it is correct that a DVD can't have only DTS as a soundtrack, some DVDs are set up this way. I have a copy of Jackie Chan's most recent film, _The Myth_, that I purchased through the Internet as an import from Hong Kong. The DVD with the film has 2 soundtracks - a DTS soundtrack for the film and an AC3 soundtrack for Jackie's Mandarin commentary. So technically the disc does have AC3 and DTS soundtracks, but only one of them is the movie audio.
I just wanted to point out that DVDs like this might be a very good reason why someone might want to replace a DTS soundtrack with an AC3 soundtrack.

[astrocity20]

Thanks Manono you were right on the button. Just had to go into PGC edit and change the audio stream to 0 and it works perfectly now Brilliant!

edit: Hopefully it'll work on a standalone as well

[manono]

Good going astrocity20. Yeah, I was probably thinking too much with my last 2 posts. Simpler is often better, and I should have suggested just turning on Stream zero in the first place. But there are different ways it could be done, and there's no telling what the original encoder did with either the audio streams or the menu. Thanks for reporting back. I'm sure it'll play fine in the standalone. One thing you might check though, is to make sure that the different channels play correctly. You want to make sure that when someone on the right side of the screen is talking, that the sound doesn't come from the left speaker (or worse, from a rear speaker). That's a problem when getting the 6 Mono WAV files from a DTS track using BeSweet. They're all set for the wrong channels.

jman98- Yes you're right. There can be a number of reasons to convert the DTS to AC3. I've done it twice when there was a 6 channel DTS, but only a stereo AC3, and I wanted the surround sound. I've done it once when there was 6 channel DTS and a stereo WAV file, and I also wanted the surround sound. Having a 6 channel DTS and a commentary track as the only other choice is a new one for me though. My receiver doesn't decode DTS either. Plus, when backing up to a DVD5, the DTS often just takes up way too much room to get the video compressed with good quality.

[astrocity20]

hm, well I didn't convert the DTS to 6 Wavs then to AC3. I did a direct DTS to AC3 5.1 conversion. Hopefully it works. For me personally I only have 2 speakers anyhow. But I did it that way just in case someone else has surround sound :P And the fact no one I know of can play DTS. Not any real way I could test it anyhow with a lack of surround sound I guess hehe :P

edit: I find that my converted ac3 even on 2 speakers seems to perhaps be incorrect. Some of the sound for certain is lower. I dunno if that has to do with the channels being wrong or what. But at the moment I'm converting the ac3 back the 6 PCM Wav files and doing the same with the dts. Getting this corrected would be the last thing to do, then I'm fully complete... I hope.

re-edit: One last thing... what do these channels names signify? C,FL,FR,LFE,SL,SR?

I'm guessing Center, Front left, Front Right, (not sure about LFE) Side Left, Side Right?

[manono]

You have the first 3 correct.
LFE=Bass (must stand for something, but I don't know what)
SL=Surround Left (rear left)
SR=Surround Right (rear right)

I could give the remappings from BeSweet, but 1) you're not doing it the same way, and 2) I've found 2 different remappings. It's not usually difficult to sort them out. The LFE has the least activity and is real low sounding. The Center has the most activity. To get the FL and FR for sure, it may be best to play the DVD or the DTS track, find a place where something's coming from one side and find the same place in one of the other WAV files. The surrounds may be tricky for you, not having a surround sound system. In general, there's less activity from the 2 surrounds than from the 3 front speakers. If you're lucky, you can find a place where something is (for example) in both the front right and surround right speakers, perhaps an instrument from some music, or some gunfire. The front right will have more activity (more and bigger wave forms) than will the surround right.

[astrocity20]

I'm pretty sure I have the channels sorted ok. But dammit if it isn't one thing it's the next. I spilt the DTS out into 6 wavs, then went from there to ac3... the sound while it seems like everything is in the right spot... is VERY low. And quite annoyingly low imo. I mean if I can't get anything else I guess I'll take it and try to crank up my stereo speakers. But is there anyway I can get up the over all sound of this thing? I read it was some problem with ac3enc or somethin I dunno, it's very disconcerting though.

[manono]

How are you playing it? Just the AC3 file on the computer? The DVD on the computer? The DVD in the standalone? The WAV files play loud enough, but after converting to AC3 they're too soft?

I thought they got the low audio that ac3enc.dll produced sorted out. Maybe not. Do you have the latest version? I can't really help you there, as audio's not really my thing. Maybe someone else knows the answers.

[astrocity20]

I'm playing the movie and the AC3 at the moment on the computer with WinDVD. The wavs play quite a bit louder then I encode them and they're quiet. I'm pretty sure I have the latest ac3enc... but I'll redownload it from Besweet plugins and see. If you don't know then that's ok I can just make my way to the audio section You've helped me a lot. Thanks

[Gatts79]

Hello everyone. I've been trying to follow along with the DTS conversion to AC3 and then replaceing it, but I'm having alot of problems. I hope someone out there can help please:

First I used the PGC Demux program metioned up top to DeMux the Video and Sound. In the options of PgcDemux v1.2.0.4 i have Demux vdeo stream, Demux all audio streams, Demux all subpic streams, Creat CellTimes.txt & Create Logfile checked. I left Include endtime under CellTimes.txt unchecked and I left Creat a PGC VOB unchecked. Under mode I have by VOBid. I did this because when I left it under by PGC there was multiple files under PGC Selection. Anyway i get 1 video file *m2v, 1 subpicture file *.sup, 1 sound filed *.dts and one CellTimes.txt file.

Second I use tranzcode to convert the *.dts file into 6 mono Wav files. Next I use BSMUXWIZ (besweet mux creater) to make a *.mux file for besweet. I then use Besweet + GUI to create an *.ac3 file by loading the *.mux file. I slect Besweet.exe in Locations menu for input i have my *.mux file and for ouput I have *.ac3. I have the AC3/OOG/PCM frame selected. I then set the AC3 encoding options to Bitrate 448 and Create 5.1 AC3 and Endians set to Motorola (I also made one useing Intel later when things didnt work). and i selected mux to AC3 button to get my AC3 5.1 file.

Now comes the problem. I am useing Muxman 0.14 to mux the video and audio into a vob file. I set the video file to the *.m2v file and for the audio I have the *.ac3 file. I then select the *.sup file for subpicture and set the track 1 to letterobx and widesceen (video is Letterbox). I then import the CellTime.txt file and I have 13 scenes now. I click the Start to Multiplex. Not even a minute has passed and I get the error "Multiplex Operation Failed, Probably Caused by Excessive Bitrate".

I've tried remaking the *.ac3 file even making the *.mux file myself in case it was the problem. The *.ac3 file plays fine with no errors and same goes with the standalone *.m2v file. I got fed up and registered for the Muxman 0.16 advanced hoping that would help, but no dice there. Same error and now i know it happens in Cell 2 of the Muxing.

Can Anyone give me any advice on what to do from here ? I was trying xmuxer pro 1.1 to mux them together, but it wont let me add in seperate audio files. Any advice would be appreciated.

[manono]

You'll have to reencode the video, or run another pass or 2 if you used CCE and still have the vaf file. I think you probably set the max bitrate too high. If you have one DD 5.1 AC3 at 448, and a couple of subs, then I use 9625. If you use a different encoder that may not respect the max bitrate set, or want to be absolutely safe, then use 9500 or even 9000 for the max bitrate. What'd you do, set it for 9800 originally?

You might also run the AC3 through AC3Fix to make sure it's OK.

[Gatts79]

The video encoding was a result of demuxing with PgcDemux as u suggested to use to get rid of the DTS audio. I didn't see any option for the video settings so I'm just guessing its a default MPEG 2 complient DVD file.

I'll try the AC3fix to see how that is and post back my findings. So you think recoding the video with CCE and increasing max bitrate to 9800 will help? You have any suggestions in software besides CCE? how about TMPEGenc?

Thanks thus far bro. Anymore help is greatly appreciated

[manono]

Oh, so you didn't reencode the video? Then something else is at work, and I suspect the AC3 you created.

You shouldn't have to reencode the video, not if the retail had a DTS track originally. I've never seen DTS with a bitrate lower than 768, and your AC3 is less than that. By the way, what is the DTS bitrate? Playing the DVD in PowerDVD with the OSD on will tell you. The size of the AC3 is smaller than that of the DTS, isn't it? I hope that using AC3Fix does the trick, otherwise I'm stumped.

[Gatts79]

This is the information I got from Power DVD 6:

Player Information:
Player Region Code: Not Specified
Current Drive: H:
Title Region Code: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, All

Display Information:
Video Mode: Progressive
Display Mode: DirectDraw
FourCC Code: YUY2
Surface Type: Overlay

Video Attributes:
Video compression mode: MPEG-2
TV system: 525/60 (NTSC)
Aspect Ratio: 4:3
Display Mode: Both Pan&scan and Letterbox
Source picture resolution: 720x480 (525/60)
Frame Rate: 30.00
Source picture letterboxed: Not letterboxed
Bitrate: 4.69Mbps

Audio Attributes:
Audio Coding mode: Dolby Digital
Sampling Rate: 48kHz
Audio application mode: Not specified
Number of Audio channels: 2
Bitrate: 192 Kbps
Number of Audio streams: 3

Subpicture Attribute:
Number of Subtitles: 2

Hardware Information:
Processor: AMD Athlon(tm) 64 Processor 3400+ running at 2193 MHz
3DNow! Technology: In Use
Enhanced 3DNow! Technology: In Use
3DNow! Professional Technology: In Use
IA MMX Technology: In Use
IA Streaming SIMD Extensions: In Use
IA SSE 2: In Use
Video Accelerator: DirectX VA (not in use)
Multispeaker Audio Device: NVIDIA(R) nForce(TM) Audio (not in use)
SPDIF Output Device: NVIDIA(R) nForce(TM) Audio (not in use)

Not sure if any of that helps. As for useing AC3fix it says that Input ok and Ouput Ok when i use the process button. So it looks like the AC3 File is ok. To be safe I went back demuxed the vob again and remade another ac3 file... Still no dice. The orginal DTS file i get from PgcDemux says its 768kbps, 6 channel, 48000 hz. So it looks to me that both original video and DTS sound are correct formats and rates. The final AC3 file says through AC3fix that it is correct too. So I'm just stumped here.

You've been very helpful, I hope you have some more suggestions bro. Thanks In Advance.

[manono]

Try using IFOEdit for the muxing. I suspect it'll also choke on it, but it may give you more information about the problem. If you need a guide, then try this one:

http://www.doom9.org/mpg/ifoedit-dvdauthor.htm

Start part way through Step 4, about where it says, "Then select Author new DVD from the DVD Author menu. " It takes the same audio, video, SUP format subs and Celltimes.txt file input as does Muxman.

The muxing will go faster if you move the new muxing screen down to just above the bottom of the monitor screen, so only the top is visible. Strange but true.

[Abond]

I had the same error with muxman. It is a bit strange. If I demux with DVDDecrypter from the disc, I can remux with muxman without problems. If I rip to big vob and demux afterwards with ReJig, muxman give the same error at remuxing.

[Gatts79]

Update:

I tried Infoedit and partway through the begining I see SRC coming too late or something to that effect. I get like about 8 of these before a popup says I was loosing too many frames and cancels the muxing.

I did however see that the Bit Rate on the video = 9000000 and the audio normal bitrate is 57344 Bps [448 kbps]. The estimated multiplexed stream data rate is 9148400 and valid DVD program Mux Rate = 10080000.

I'm not sure exactly how these values may have affected the muxing if at all, but if you have any insight I sure would appreciate it. I guess now I will try starting from the begining Useing DVD Decrypter as suggested for the time being and post my results shortly.

You've been a great help & I hope you got more ideas / tricks to try =)

[manono]

I still suspect the audio. Do you have any other way to do the conversion from 6 WAV files to AC3?

I'm out of ideas at this point, but I've asked someone with much more knowledge of Muxman and authoring problems than I to help out. Stand by. In the meantime, please post the relevant parts of the Muxman log. You'll find in in the root of the C Drive. Just click on the drive and you should see the muxman.log. If you've muxed something else since then, then please run it again with your problematic video. Thanks.

[manono]

Hey,

I had a response to my request for help from mpucoder, the author of Muxman. He suggests that the PGCDemux created M2V may be at fault. He says you can confirm by authoring only the video, without the audio or subs. If it aborts early again, then the video is at fault. If true, then he suggests getting the video by using VobEdit.

So, first use Muxman to try and author just the M2V. If it aborts, then demux using VobEdit and try again using all the assets (video, audio, subs, and celltimes text).