How to play a BluRay with PotPlayer??

[DSperber]

Newbie here with PotPlayer. Can't figure out how to use it to play a BluRay movie disc.

I do have AnyDVDHD installed if that is required to be running (as I imagine it is), although obviously it is not required when I use PowerDVD12 to play BluRay movies.

So, can someone please give me the step-by-step what do I do to play a BluRay movie using PotPlayer.

Thanks.

[usually_quiet]

If all else fails, you can probably play the .m2ts video file with the main movie in PotPlayer. I don't recall reading that PotPlayer has Blu-ray menu support. If you can open the BD disc to browse for video files, look in BDMV\STREAM\ for the .m2ts files. The largest .m2ts file is usually the main movie.

[DSperber]

If all else fails, you can probably play the .m2ts video file with the main movie in PotPlayer. I don't recall reading that PotPlayer has Blu-ray menu support. If you can open the BD disc to browse for video files, look in BDMV\STREAM\ for the .m2ts files. The largest .m2ts file is usually the main movie.

Already tried that. Yes, the individual .m2ts files will play (being decrypted by AnyDVDHD) but the largest one isn't necessarily THE movie file. It might be the last 1:30 or something of a 1:45 movie, don't ask me why.

The .mpls files seemed promising as well, but there's no easy way to know which one is for what setup/configuration use.

I thought people were touting PotPlayer as being a "BluRay media player... KING OF MEDIA PLAYERS", specifically to play BluRay movies. Is this pure fiction??

I don't actually need it as I have PowerDVD12 which obviously works perfectly fine for my needs (actually, I have no needs since I have an external mechanical Oppo BluRay player in my entertainment system and do NOT use my PC for playing BluRay movies on my real HDTV). So this is all quite theoretical, to see how to play BluRay movies on my PC.

But so far, it would appear someone's telling a big fib about PotPlayer actually being a true USABLE AND USEFUL media player capable of really playing BluRay movie discs.

Anybody else have the answer to my question??

[usually_quiet]

Pot Player has a lot of fans, and some of them are very enthusiastic about it, maybe a little too enthusiastic at times. I have tried it, but I'm not fond of the interface and didn't find that it offered any particular benefits for my purposes,

The development teams for VLC and MediaPortal are working on adding full Blu-Ray support to them, but so far there are no free programs that are really close to being able to do everything that the better paid Blu-Ray player software can do. I went ahead and bought PowerDVD 12 Ultra too.

[Steve(MS)]

I don't actually need it as I have PowerDVD12 which obviously works perfectly fine for my needs (actually, I have no needs since I have an external mechanical Oppo BluRay player in my entertainment system and do NOT use my PC for playing BluRay movies on my real HDTV). So this is all quite theoretical, to see how to play BluRay movies on my PC.

But so far, it would appear someone's telling a big fib about PotPlayer actually being a true USABLE AND USEFUL media player capable of really playing BluRay movie discs.

Anybody else have the answer to my question??

If you don't have a need for it and as you stated you have powerdvd, why are you asking about it?

Short answer is if one remuxes a blu-ray disc main movie to only one m2ts, then it will play in potplayer, etc.

You are comparing a payware to freeware, one would hope a payware is a better product.
Those payware players have to pay fees in order to have full support for blu-ray discs.
The creators of the blu-ray format made it very complicated to play menus and extras
and we still don't have very good freeware authoring tools.

Give thanks to Sony for all that.

[turk690]

...I went ahead and bought PowerDVD 12 Ultra too.

I bought PowerDVD12. It mutes the audio of some copies I made of BDs I own, anyDVD notwithstanding. Research pointed to the Cinavia-infested nature of PowerDVD12, so in the end, since it was a new re-installation of Windows, I reformatted C: and just put back PowerDVD9. Worked as good as it always did.

[usually_quiet]

...I went ahead and bought PowerDVD 12 Ultra too.

I bought PowerDVD12. It mutes the audio of some copies I made of BDs I own, anyDVD notwithstanding. Research pointed to the Cinavia-infested nature of PowerDVD12, so in the end, since it was a new re-installation of Windows, I reformatted C: and just put back PowerDVD9. Worked as good as it always did.

Thanks, but I was already aware that the latest versions of commercial players comply with Cinavia when I bought PowerDVD 12 Ultra. It isn't a problem for me because I don't copy Blu-Ray discs or download Blu-Ray rips. I bought PowerDVD12 Ultra specifically to play original discs I buy or rent.

[DSperber]

In passing, I notice that a number of recent updates with AnyDVDHD deal specifically with Cinavia issues.

But as was already mentioned, I too do not have anything but commercially purchased genuine BluRay discs. No rips, no MKV versions re-muxed, no copies. I previously had PowerDVD9 Ultra and a few months ago upgraded to PowerDVD12. However as I've stated, I honestly don't use this software at all because I never really play BluRay movies through my PC. I only play BluRay movies via my "real" Oppo players to my HDTV through my home theater system.

So all software players for BluRay are just "playing in the sandbox", experimenting and trying things. I've got a whole bunch of assorted players that I've tried over the years, but WMP seems to work fine for me for virtually everything, with VLC covering for the rest. With WMC acting as my HTPC (Ceton InfiniTV 4-tuner card for cable, and Hauppauge HVR-2250 2-tuner card for OTA/ATSC) delivering HDTV to the three HDTV's around my house, I have to be very careful NOT to install any outside codec-packs to destroy the integrity of Windows Media Foundation which is why WMP and WMC work so well for me and my own video collection. ZERO need for anything outside of FFDSHOW (needed for multiAVCHD when I burn my own BluRay collections from VideoReDo-edited copy-freely WTV programs recorded by WMC).

And in particular I'm just really experimenting with PotPlayer (having only learned about it for the very first time this past week in a thread on SevenForums which touted it as "yet another media player to play BluRay movies"... and free). PotPlayer seems to handle things better than VLC, from what I've tried. I also like the way it looks (using XMP4 skin).

Again, none of this is urgent or critical. But I thought I was going to find a free media player that actually COULD truly play a commercial BluRay movie disc conveniently. Seems I was mistaken.

[katipo]

You absolutely can "play a commerical BD movie conveniently" on the PC.

I use AnyDVD + mostly either Potplayer or TMT (if a full menu is absolutely required). The beauty of Potplayer (or VLC, MPC-HC) with AnyDVD and commercial discs is rapid movie start - no Warnings, Intros, Java, or BD+ to block Resume play. A good software player will auto parse the main feature playlist (correct most of the time, otherwise pretty easy to guess). Potplayer in particular is terrific for resuming the last play position even after a restart. AnyDVD HD also features Speedmenu which is another quick start method (title list), open with TMT or similar.

[jman98]

DSperber - You are wasting your money with PowerDVD. The ONLY commercial BluRay player anybody should buy is Total Media Theater. Cyberlink (they make PowerDVD) is pretty consumer hostile. I gave up on them years ago when they took away the ability to make snapshots from movies because Hollywood literally feared that someone might use it to "copy" an entire movie frame by frame. Of course this in no way explained how said pirates were going to copy the audio too. Every release of PowerDVD through about 9 got less and less functional than the one before it and I stopped keeping it. I honestly wondered if it might reach the point where PowerDVD wouldn't play any files at all because they sure seemed headed in that direction.

VLC used to be a great program and I still use it, but the whole 2.x release has just really sucked in my opinion. I at least give them credit that they finally got the various code bases in alignment with 2.x (the Apple one in particular was divergent enough from the Windows code base to be a completely different product) but I am really disappointed in VLC now. It didn't give me a lot of hope to read about all the time their main developer spent to remove VLC from the Apple Store for iPhone and iPad over (in my opinion) a "cut your nose off to spite your face" spat over licensing terminology used by Apple.

NO free players can play BluRay perfectly all the time. That's why we buy Total Media Theater. At least Arcsoft still values its customers, unlike Cyberlink who can't go far enough to please their evil masters in Hollywood.

[usually_quiet]

I tried both TMT and PowerDVD Ultra before purchasing. I don't care about making screen shots. I was only looking for the ability to play Blu-Ray movies from the original discs. Both PowerDVD Ultra and TMT performed well for playing discs, so I decided to save some money and buy PowerDVD 12 Ultra for $30 less. (Both TMT and PowerDVD offered substantial discount at the time.)

Companies like Nero, Corel, Cyberlink and ArcSoft don't really have much choice but to comply with what the entertainment industry in general or Sony in particular wants. Only a small percentage of consumers use software players for playing Blu-Ray discs, so software companies seeking licensing have even less to bargain with than companies making hardware Blu-Ray players. That is why, among other things, the current versions of all licensed commercial software Blu-Ray players are Cinavia compliant and HDCP compliant. It is a requirement for obtaining an AACS license. Unlike Slysoft or DVDFab, which can't be sued on account of their location, Nero, Corel, Cyberlink and ArcSoft need to make a licensed product to avoid lawsuits.

[DSperber]

You absolutely can "play a commerical BD movie conveniently" on the PC.

Using PotPlayer? HOW??? Obviously I can play it with PowerDVD, but I'm trying to learn how to play it with PotPlayer and have no idea what I need to do.

What is "step #1", etc., to get me started? Obviously I'm not seeing what it is I need to push or open to actually get the movie playing.

I use AnyDVD + mostly either Potplayer or TMT (if a full menu is absolutely required). The beauty of Potplayer (or VLC, MPC-HC) with AnyDVD and commercial discs is rapid movie start - no Warnings, Intros, Java, or BD+ to block Resume play. A good software player will auto parse the main feature playlist (correct most of the time, otherwise pretty easy to guess).

Please don't keep this information secret: WHAT IS THE MAIN FEATURE PLAYLIST??

With PotPlayer where do I go, what mouse-clicks, what menus, what folders on the BluRay disk to I have to open or navigate through, what do I look for, what do I do, what do I KNOW vs. GUESS, how do I get started??

Clearly I'm not seeing something that perhaps should be known in advance, which is exactly why I posted this thread.

Please share the "how to play a BluRay"instructions, with specifics.

Potplayer in particular is terrific for resuming the last play position even after a restart. AnyDVD HD also features Speedmenu which is another quick start method (title list), open with TMT or similar.

I have AnyDVDHD and PotPlayer.

I have a commercial BluRay movie disc.

Tell me what to do to play that BluRay movie disc with AnyDVDHD and PotPlayer please.

[DSperber]

NO free players can play BluRay perfectly all the time.

If PotPlayer is one of these free players that actually can play BluRay SOME OF THE TIME, please tell me HOW? How does one actually open the disc and start playing the movie???

That's why we buy Total Media Theater. At least Arcsoft still values its customers, unlike Cyberlink who can't go far enough to please their evil masters in Hollywood.

I tried TMT many years ago, but felt it to be "intrusive", much as MediaMonkey is an application that "wants to be your TOTAL MEDIA EXPERIENCE", rather than just an organizer or player that I CONTROL rather than IT CONTROLS ME.

I want individual tools and programs, that I initiate their functions when I want to use them. I didn't get the feeling that TMT was like that... just a "player".

Anyway, I'm not trying to defend the commercial products, and PowerDVD vc. TMT (although I do think that WinDVD was crap). I'm only trying to learn how to use PotPlayer to play a BluRay disc movie... from the very first step, through each button-push or action I must take. What is the recipe?

[katipo]

What is "step #1", etc., to get me started? Obviously I'm not seeing what it is I need to push or open to actually get the movie playing.

1. Start AnyDVD HD (wait until it says it's ready)
2. Start PotPlayer
3. Press [F2] (Open Directory), Select the BD drive
or: right click inside the PP window, select Open, CD-Drive (last item normally)

The movie should now start!

You can also create a desktop shortcut:
e.g. "C:\Program Files\PotPlayer\PotPlayer.exe" /cd:F (where 'F' is your BD drive)
(this shortcut will always start at the beginning; to Resume start PotPlayer normally and just press Play)

Once playing, if you look at the top menu bar you'll see the Playlist that it has auto selected (or press [F6]), this is generally correct. Rarely, you may need to select another playlist: Stop playback (important), Open File [Ctl O], select the .mpls in the BDMV\PLAYLIST folder. There may be a lot of them, certain studios use common playlist numbers for their main feature and another for the extended cuts. They are often consecutive. e.g. 00000/00001 or 00800/00801 are common, but this is not an absolute.

I should mention that PotPlayer has a problem with seamless BD playlists. It's noticeable if you use the scrub-bar a bit (particularly reverse) rather than just watching the movie from start to finish (which seems fine). Pause/Play is of course fine. I posted a bug report (on this forum too), but haven't seen any fixes listed yet. VLC will play seamless BD playlists flawlessly, but I prefer PotPlayer in every other regard (speed & stability) so will wait patiently.

[katipo]

Potplayer Useful shortcuts

[A] Audio stream select
[L] Subtitle stream select
[Alt+H] Show/Hide Subtitles
[F] [D] Frame Advance | Back
[Lft] [Rgt] Skip (with Ctl, Alt, Shift variations)
[Sht+PgDn|PgUp] Chapter Skip
[H] Chapter/Bookmark select
[V] Switch Video Renderer (test with restart). Spend some time getting this right ('Auto' may not be ideal).
[Ctl+E] Screen Snapshot (actual size)
[Ctl+Alt+E] Snapshot (win size)
[Tab], [Alt+F1] Info (pause BD first if entering extended info tab)
Mouse: rt-click 'Filters / HDMV Playlist Source' to select Video (incl PiP)/ Audio/ Subtitle streams

Tip: Everything in PotPlayer is configurable (I'm still learning). Using the right skin can make a huge difference to your experience. Skins allow nearly any setting to be switched, or info to be displayed. Although I still like the uncluttered original TMT3 lookalike skin.

[netmask56]

So far I can play all my original BluRay discs using VLC with the plugin. No menu's but goes to the main movie complete with chapters...

[Steve(MS)]

If PotPlayer is one of these free players that actually can play BluRay SOME OF THE TIME, please tell me HOW? How does one actually open the disc and start playing the movie???

I don't know about playing the original blu-ray discs in potplayer but many of us simply rip the main movie out, putting the main movie in one m2ts file.
This way one can play in almost any media player that is capable of HD and playing m2ts files.
Players that can do this, whether burned back to disc or simply playing the m2ts file include but not limited to VLC, Potplayer, SMplayer,MPC-HC and splash lite.

VLC with patches can play store bought blu-ray discs, I would say most of them...the main movie part.
That should include all older blu-rays...the ones in the past couple of years...some of them with the advanced java and fake playlists...not.
Once again I doubt any freeware will play menus...at least not accurately.

[DSperber]

What is "step #1", etc., to get me started? Obviously I'm not seeing what it is I need to push or open to actually get the movie playing.

1. Start AnyDVD HD (wait until it says it's ready)
2. Start PotPlayer
3. Press [F2] (Open Directory), Select the BD drive

Indeed!!

My mistake was that I was pushing the OPEN button right in the middle of the player (I use XMP4 skin). This initiates the OPEN dialog window, but if you select the drive here nothing happens. Apparently that's because this OPEN dialog is actually an "Open File" dialog and I haven't actually selected a FILE.

I never knew about F2 to initiate the "Browse for folder" dialog, where if you select the drive PotPlayer obviously now searches for that main playlist file in the "folder" which is the entire drive's folder structure, finds it in the \BDMV\Playlists folder, and starts playing as it should.

One simple mistake... that's all I made. Your tip has enlightened me.

or: right click inside the PP window, select Open, CD-Drive (last item normally)

Never even thought to do that, since I was pushing the obvious OPEN button that had been planted right in the middle of the player interface. Why wouldn't I just use it if it has been placed there for my convenience?? How foolish of me.

Also, right-click while the mouse is over the OPEN button in the center of the XMP4 skin actually does nothing. You have to have known to right click off of the OPEN button, elsewhere in the player window, in order to get the context menu. GRRRR...

Nevertheless, sure enough now that you've given me these facts, right-click on the proper area of the PP window and -> OPEN (not Open Files, which actually opens the \BDMV\Playlists folder on the disc) and sure enough at the bottom of the OPEN flyout menu is the item to select the drive itself. And selecting it surely does now initiate proper playing of the disc in the drive (obviously finding the \BDMV\Playlists folder and using the main playlist).

The movie should now start!

You are 100% correct!

MANY MANY THANKS!

Once playing, if you look at the top menu bar you'll see the Playlist that it has auto selected (or press [F6]), this is generally correct.

As you speculate, in my experiment it was 00800.mpls.

I hadn't stumbled into that one when I was first experimenting. I thought it would be a LARGE playlist file rather than a tiny 1K playlist file, which would probably correspond to the main movie with many dozens shown. Obviously I was wrong.


Well, that's all it took. That's all I was looking for to get started, because it was clear I'd missed something very very basic.

Thank you again for that one push to get me off the dime.

[katipo]

You're welcome.
BTW, [F3] is another shortcut for Open File.

I'm not certain how PotPlayer (or VLC + MPC-HC) decides the default playlist, but most likely just scans all looking for the longest timecode. Unfortunately it's not flawless. Commercial software players (with full menu support) are more sophistocated, and seem to always get it right.


If anyone is interested in learning more about playlists, check out John Stebbins' excellent "bdtools". You can use mpls_dump to filter by timecode and remove duplicate titles. It can quickly narrow potentially hundreds of playlists down to just a few.
http://www.stebbins.biz/source/
http://www.stebbins.biz/binaries/

[forsure]

I don't actually need it as I have PowerDVD12 which obviously works perfectly fine for my needs (actually, I have no needs since I have an external mechanical Oppo BluRay player in my entertainment system and do NOT use my PC for playing BluRay movies on my real HDTV). So this is all quite theoretical, to see how to play BluRay movies on my PC.

But so far, it would appear someone's telling a big fib about PotPlayer actually being a true USABLE AND USEFUL media player capable of really playing BluRay movie discs.

Anybody else have the answer to my question??

If you don't have a need for it and as you stated you have powerdvd, why are you asking about it?

Short answer is if one remuxes a blu-ray disc main movie to only one m2ts, then it will play in potplayer, etc.

You are comparing a payware to freeware, one would hope a payware is a better product.
Those payware players have to pay fees in order to have full support for blu-ray discs.
The creators of the blu-ray format made it very complicated to play menus and extras
and we still don't have very good freeware authoring tools.

Give thanks to Sony for all that.

I realize this thread is old, but after using MPC for ever so long and just switching to POTPlayer in 2021. I switched mainly for the HDR "effect" it has. Compared to the tv or YTube it's pretty accurate. The only trouble I have with POtplayer is the ability to play Remux files. All other HEVC 10 bit HDR files play well. According to Usually_Quiet my video card does not support HEVC. That is proven otherwise by PotPlayer.

For those who have this qualm with piracy, I just have a theory. It seems back in the day dvd screeners and "for screening purposes only" were available without the act of encoding an already sold item. Point being where do they come from if not Hollywood or whomever has the authority to have a screener? Seems to me its Hollywood or wherever that does or did the "illegal sharing" to begin with. I have never watched a camera. What just happened to bluray.com? It's been hijacked. I had all my pirated movies listed.

[usually_quiet]

What just happened to bluray.com? It's been hijacked. I had all my pirated movies listed.

I'm a member there as well. It looks as though blu-ray.com will likely be down for a while yet.

There is information about their situation posted on other Internet forums. Apparently, their server's OS HDD failed but all of the site data is fine. However, since blu-ray.com was using CentOS, which was recently discontinued, they are taking the opportunity to look into their options for a replacement OS and it will take time to install and configure their new OS and get the site up and running again

[Edit]

According to Usually_Quiet my video card does not support HEVC. That is proven otherwise by PotPlayer.

Nope. Your video card definitely can't decode HEVC but your Intel processor's iGPU can. However, neither supports HDR pass-through. PotPlayer simulates HDR via tone-mapping and that is what you are seeing. This is what I wrote in your other thread,

What does AMD reading N/A for HDR verses Intel saying 'Not Supported" tell you? In video card properties.

The video card properties confirm what I could find out using a search engine. An AMD Radeon R5 M335 doesn't even seem to support hardware-accelerated HEVC decoding. If that's true, it is very doubtful that it supports HDR10 passthrough. Although Skylake's Intel HD Graphics 520 supports hardware-accelerated HEVC decoding, it doesn't support HDR. Intel processor GPU support for HDR10 started with Kaby Lake's UHD Graphics 620 and UHD Graphics 630.

[Edit]Neither of your computer's GPUs are adequate for playing UHD content with HDR10 passthrough. The Intel processor's HEVC decoding combined with a player that supports tone-mapping to simulate HDR might provide OK results.

[forsure]

What just happened to bluray.com? It's been hijacked. I had all my pirated movies listed.

I'm a member there as well. It looks as though blu-ray.com will likely be down for a while yet.

There is information about their situation posted on other Internet forums. Apparently, their server's OS HDD failed but all of the site data is fine. However, since blu-ray.com was using CentOS, which was recently discontinued, they are taking the opportunity to look into their options for a replacement OS and it will take time to install and configure their new OS and get the site up and running again

[Edit]

According to Usually_Quiet my video card does not support HEVC. That is proven otherwise by PotPlayer.

Nope. Your video card definitely can't decode HEVC, but your Intel processor's iGPU can. However, neither supports HDR pass-through. PotPlayer does tone-mapping and that is what you are seeing. This is what I wrote in your other thread,

What does AMD reading N/A for HDR verses Intel saying 'Not Supported" tell you? In video card properties.

The video card properties confirm what I could find out using a search engine. An AMD Radeon R5 M335 doesn't even seem to support hardware-accelerated HEVC decoding. If that's true, it is very doubtful that it supports HDR10 passthrough. Although Skylake's Intel HD Graphics 520 supports hardware-accelerated HEVC decoding, it doesn't support HDR. Intel processor GPU support for HDR10 started with Kaby Lake's UHD Graphics 620 and UHD Graphics 630.

[Edit]Neither of your computer's GPUs are adequate for playing UHD content with HDR10 passthrough. The Intel processor's HEVC decoding combined with a player that supports tone-mapping to simulate HDR might provide OK results.

Is there anything you don't know? So why do you think I have so much trouble with REmux or BD, cause they are big?

[usually_quiet]

Is there anything you don't know? So why do you think I have so much trouble with REmux or BD, cause they are big?

Well, I definitely know enough to not answer this question. For one thing, you have your own thread on that very topic so there is no good reason to hijack an old thread on a different subject to ask about it. For another thing, helping people with the problems they are having with their movie downloads is against forum policy.