MKV wish list

[cjbrown80]

Hey all, hope you're having a joyous holidays season so far (if you're celebrating this time of year).

So my bluray backup library is basically just a bunch of ripped M2TS files consisting of the main video track, main english audio track and any english subtitle tracks (started keeping those once I discovered 'forced' subtitles.... I had NO CLUE what those damn aliens were saying in District 9!) I played these files from my WHS with MPC-HC and that always worked fine.

I just recently got my HTPC setup for bitstreaming (TrueHD and DTS-MA) right from WMC thanks to the guides by Damian (a true WMC genius). Now what I'd like to be able to do is convert all these M2TS files to MKV without spending the time to re-rip from the blurays. Here's the catch: I've tried every bit of software I can find and RipBot and Handbrake seem to be the best(easiest). I've spent a great deal of time learning about x264 over the last week or so and I love all the advanced encoding options they both offer. What I don't like is that both RipBot and Handbrake force the HD audio down to just the core 5.1 tracks (DTS or AC3, no DTS-MA or TrueHD). I'll be re-encoding the video to reduce file size, but I need to keep the original audio intact (a true pass-thru, not just the core). BluRip is an app that seemingly can do this, but I don't find it very easy to use, and it's video encoding options seem to be crippled in comparison to the others. BD Rebuilder only works from the disc or iso and as I said before, that'll be too time consuming.
Basically, I'd love something similar to RipBot or Handbrake that can preserve the original HD audio track, with all the nice x264 options, batch processing so I can setup 8 or 10 conversions at a time, and the ability to burn in a subtitle track for those annoying forced subs you stumble upon once in a while.

Any ideas or recommendations would be greatly appreciated!

[Anonymous30]

Hey all, hope you're having a joyous holidays season so far (if you're celebrating this time of year).

So my bluray backup library is basically just a bunch of ripped M2TS files consisting of the main video track, main english audio track and any english subtitle tracks (started keeping those once I discovered 'forced' subtitles.... I had NO CLUE what those damn aliens were saying in District 9!) I played these files from my WHS with MPC-HC and that always worked fine.

I just recently got my HTPC setup for bitstreaming (TrueHD and DTS-MA) right from WMC thanks to the guides by Damian (a true WMC genious). Now what I'd like to be able to do is convert all these M2TS files to MKV without spending the time to re-rip from the blurays. Here's the catch: I've tried every bit of software I can find and RipBot and Handbrake seem to be the best(easiest). I've spent a great deal of time learning about x264 over the last week or so and I love all the advanced encoding options they both offer. What I don't like is that both RipBot and Handbrake force the HD audio down to just the core 5.1 tracks (DTS or AC3, no DTS-MA or TrueHD). I'll be re-encoding the video to reduce file size, but I need to keep the original audio intact (a true pass-thru, not just the core). BluRip is an app that seemingly can do this, but I don't find it very easy to use, and it's video encoding options seem to be crippled in comparison to the others. BD Rebuilder only works from the disc or iso and as I said before, that'll be too time consuming.
Basically, I'd love something similar to RipBot or Handbrake that can preserve the original HD audio track, with all the nice x264 options, batch processing so I can setup 8 or 10 conversions at a time, and the ability to burn in a subtitle track for those annoying forced subs you stumble upon once in a while.

Any ideas or recommendations would be greatly appreciated!

If you dont need to shrink the file size - DVDFAB Platinum works great and will preserve the HD Audio inside the MKV.

Hope this Helps
AJ

[Baldrick]

You can copy the audio in ripbot264, change to copy stream under profile. Or maybe it doesn't work for DTS-MA or TrueHD.

[cjbrown80]

Thanks for the replies.

AJ, I do need to shrink the size so DVDFab won't work.

Baldrick, the current version of ripbot264 makes you choose between Flac, Wave and Core, for the audio track when it's analyzing the streams.

I took another look at BluRip and actually found a way to change some of the more complex x264 parameters (command line of course), it's still not easy to use though and I don't think it has an option for burning in subs.

Does anyone know what's up with BluRip? It hasn't been updated in a year, is he still working on it or is it abandonware now?

[pascal]

I wonder if you can demux DTS-MA from M2TS and add it back to your final MKV with mkvmerge.
It works with DTS. It might as well with DTS-MA

THD/Core can be demuxed from M2TS
But it ends up being THD only with StaxRip because it seems THD/Core is not supported by mkvmerge which keeps THD but removes Core

Cheers

[cjbrown80]

The mkvmerge option worked for me, but it adds an extra step which would effectively double the time required= not optimal. I hope to do most of these conversions in batches of 8 or 10 (24 hours worth) so I don't have to constantly monitor.

[OutOfBreath]

Try VidCoder.

It uses the Handbrake engine for conversion and will allow you to keep whatever audio tracks you like without touching them. Very easy to use as well.

Paul

[MilesAhead]

TEncoder may be worth a look. I've used it almost exclusively to put .mkv into an .mp4 container only processing the audio. So I'm not sure of the video processing quality. But it is designed for batch mode. It has Copy option for video and audio, so it should just use your audio track as is. I've only used the FFMPeg encoder(also has Mencoder) and with that the batch processing really flies along.. more efficient than doing a single file as far as CPU core usage.

If none of the bit rate values and other settings on the video conversion are to your liking you can export to batch file to change the values in a text editor, then run the batch job.


edit: almost forgot. When encoding video it does have an option to burn in subtitles, but I believe that option is only enabled using Mencoder.

[cjbrown80]

Paul, you are the man. That's exactly what I was looking for. It doesn't seem to have the ability to burn in subtitles like Handbrake, but for those few movies I need to do that I can use ripbot and just remux with the HD audio track. Thank you!

[cjbrown80]

So VidCoder worked great with some DTS-HD tracks but I just loaded up a TrueHD track and it won't let it pass thru. Does the version you use have this ability?