Blu-ray discs freezing when fast-forwarding & going to a sub-chapter

[KingKRool2002]

Hi,

I use Total Media Extreme 2 to create a blu-ray folder and then burn it with ImgBurn. I just got a new PC (my old one died) and this is the first time I'm trying to make s blu-ray on my new pc. I used FRAPS videos for my blu-ray and I use TDK 4x 25 GB BD-R Printable discs (I get them from Japan).

The problem I am having is that, while watching a video on the disc, I can't fast-forward, skip to next video/sub-chapter, or go to the previous video/sub-chapter. If I try that, the image just freezes for a little bit and then it goes straight to the main menu. If I try selecting a sub-chapter from one of the video sub-menus, the same thing happens.

This happened to me before, way back when I first started burning blu-rays on my previous PC. The problem went away after some time (I still don't know why it just magically went away) and I've had no trouble with BD-R discs since then (until now with my new PC). Is there something I need to update on my pc to get this working? It plays fine on my PC, but not on my Blu-ray player.

My Blu-ray player is a Panasonic DMP-BD85. Other TDK discs that were done on my old pc work fine, so either I have something set-up wrong in ImgBurn (I let it select the correct options when it auto-detected during my first burn) or TME2 or my blu-ray writable drive. Does anyone have any suggestions to fix this problem? I can't really watch any of the pc game videos I recorded because there's no way (aside from watching the whole video again) to get back to the spot I stopped at previously. Any help would be greatly appreciated.

BTW, the discs were burned at 4.0x (which is apparently the default write speed for ImgBurn), but since the disc was successfully verified after the burn finished, I'm assuming that burning it at the disc's Max speed isn't what's causing the problem, right?

Thanks.

EDIT: BTW, my PC's B-R writable drive model is PLDS DH-8B2SH.

[jman98]

I bought TDK BD-R printable discs from Japan too - ONCE. I foolishly did no research. I was quite horrified to find that they are made by Ritek, which is a notorious crap disc manufacturer.

Can you open an M2TS file (open a big one) with MediaInfo and post back what it says? Maybe there's something not quite right in your videos that the player is barfing on. It could also be that your player doesn't like your discs. The best BD discs bar none are Verbatim's. Taiyo Yuden dabbles in it, but only for BD-R LTH. Their LTH series from a couple of years ago were hands down the best BD-R discs ever. Unfortunately JVC bought out their disc business and the manufacturing changed on their BD-R LTH discs. They're not as good. One of my standalone players that played the old LTH discs fine won't touch the new ones. And an LG burner I have that read the old LTH discs fine won't read the new ones. The only BD disc manufacturer I trust any more is Verbatim. Even Verbatim's LTH discs work well for me. TY is fine for CD and DVD media still. If you have the ability to buy Verbatim BD-R (avoid the LTH ones for now) and can burn to them, you could burn the same thing and see if it plays better. If so, then blame the TDK discs. Verbatim makes top notch BD-RE discs too, so if you want to be cheap, get one of those and burn to it and see how it plays on the player. Every BD player I've ever tried Verbatim's BD-RE discs in would play them.

[KingKRool2002]

I'll post what MediaInfo says in a bit. How "big" should the M2TS file be for the test? BTW, the M2TS file is on the blu-ray disc I burned, right? The original videos were in .avi format (but in HD).

Thanks.

UPDATE: Is this a good BD-R Verbatim disc to get?

Verbatim 97457 25 GB 6x Blu-ray Single Layer Recordable Disc BD-R

http://www.amazon.com/Verbatim-97457-Blu-ray-Recordable-25-Disc/dp/B00471HK0Q/ref=sr_1...=verbatim+bd-r


BTW, here's what MediaInfo showed for the file on the TDK disc I was having problems with:

General
ID : 0 (0x0)
Complete name : F:\BDMV\STREAM\00005.m2ts
Format : BDAV
Format/Info : Blu-ray Video
File size : 4.34 GiB
Duration : 38mn 26s
Overall bit rate mode : Variable
Overall bit rate : 16.2 Mbps
Maximum Overall bit rate : 5 000 Kbps
Video
ID : 4113 (0x1011)
Menu ID : 1 (0x1)
Format : AVC
Format/Info : Advanced Video Codec
Format profile : Main@L4.1
Format settings, CABAC : Yes
Format settings, ReFrames : 2 frames
Format settings, GOP : M=3, N=13
Codec ID : 27
Duration : 38mn 26s
Bit rate : 15.1 Mbps
Width : 1 920 pixels
Height : 1 080 pixels
Display aspect ratio : 16:9
Frame rate : 29.970 fps
Color space : YUV
Chroma subsampling : 4:2:0
Bit depth : 8 bits
Scan type : Interlaced
Scan order : Top Field First
Bits/(Pixel*Frame) : 0.244
Stream size : 4.06 GiB (94%)
Audio
ID : 4352 (0x1100)
Menu ID : 1 (0x1)
Format : AC-3
Format/Info : Audio Coding 3
Mode extension : CM (complete main)
Format settings, Endianness : Big
Codec ID : 129
Duration : 38mn 26s
Bit rate mode : Constant
Bit rate : 384 Kbps
Channel(s) : 2 channels
Channel positions : Front: L R
Sampling rate : 48.0 KHz
Bit depth : 16 bits
Compression mode : Lossy
Delay relative to video : 30ms
Stream size : 106 MiB (2%)

[usually_quiet]

UPDATE: Is this a good BD-R Verbatim disc to get?

Verbatim 97457 25 GB 6x Blu-ray Single Layer Recordable Disc BD-R

http://www.amazon.com/Verbatim-97457-Blu-ray-Recordable-25-Disc/dp/B00471HK0Q/ref=sr_1...=verbatim+bd-r

I use those. I find they burn reliably using my Pioneer burner, and my relatives' LG Blu-Ray players play them without issue. However, I burn .ts and .mpg files not .m2ts.

Panasonic supposedly makes the highest quality BD-R media, but it is harder to find and costs significantly more than Verbatim.

[KingKRool2002]

I'm going to try Verbatim since it's on sale on Amazon now. Does the MediaInfo of the video I posted look good? If so, I'm guessing that it's the TDK disc and not TME2 that is causing the problem. Thanks for the info, I really appreciate it. I'll post again when I try it on a Verbatim BD-R. Hopefully that fixes the problem. I'll let you know.

Thanks.

[KingKRool2002]

Verbatim has the same problem. On my PC, I can skip sub-chapters (for some reason the first time I skipped to another sub-chapter in a video, it was weird looking, but all times after that it worked fine. Only 1 video was like this and it only happened the 1st time I skipped to sub-chapter 2). On my blu-ray player though, it still freezes whenever I try to skip to the next sub-chapter, normal fast-forward (it works in Pause mode, but it would take forever to get to the next sub-chapter that way), and whenever I try to select a sub-chapter from the Sub-Chapter menu on the disc. I'm not exactly sure what is causing the problem then. I'm guessing that it's either a setting in ImgBurn or something wrong in TME2 (despite it working fine on my old pc with the same type of discs).

If anyone has any suggestions on how to get discs working properly with my blu-ray player, please let me know. Any info would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks.

[usually_quiet]

The problem is not caused by ImgBurn. There is no better software available for burning optical media.

PLDS DH-8B2SH appears to be a Dell part number. Perhaps the BD burner in your new PC is not a very good one. Dell is not known for using top-of-the-line parts in their PCs.

There is also the possibility that the burner isn't working properly. You should check to see if the firmware is up to date. When I looked for information on the drive I found links relating to that part number going back to 2010. So, is this PC new or just new to you? If it is used the drive may have a bit of mileage on it from the previous owner.

[fritzi93]

Can you try your discs on a different standalone player? Up to at least the DMP-BD80, the Panasonic players had trouble with discs authored by tsMuxer, multiAVCHD, and discs re-encoded with BDRB. It wouldn't be surprising if your player is iffy with discs authored by TME as well. (BTW, I have TME and apart from a few test runs, don't use it to author AVCHDs or BDs).

I gather from your first post on this thread that you've successfully played on that Panasonic discs authored by TME. Still, the older Panasonics are notoriously picky, and you do state you've had trouble in the past. If convenient, I'd try another player.

[KingKRool2002]

I tried it on my other blu-ray player and the same problem occurs. I downloaded the latest firmware for my drive (latest firmware according to Dell's website was in 2011), but when I go to run the file, it says that the B-R drive already has the latest version. Do you think I should contact Dell and ask for a replacement B-R drive? It would be a pain for me to install a drive now (I just injured my leg recently), so is there anything else I can try before having to do that? (I'm assuming that I'll have to switch the drive myself and I can't really do that right now.)

[usually_quiet]

My only suggestions for things to try before swapping the BD burner for another are to burn the Verbatim BD-R discs at 4X if you are presently burning at 6X or higher, and to try using different authoring software .

The optimum burn speed is supposedly 4X for that Verbatim product. I have decided to stick with burning data for the the time being because all the products I can afford seem to be a bit buggy at this point according to user reviews. Maybe fritzi93 has a suggestion for better authoring software.

[KingKRool2002]

I set ImgBurn to 1x, but it usually ends up burning at 4x for the discs. What other authoring software do you recommend I try?

Also, I used TMPGEnc to convert some of the .mp4 files into .m2t files. How do I put those on a BD-R? I'm hoping that this method might work. Is there a recommended (and hopefully not too expensive) program that you'd recommend for doing this stuff?

I will also try using TME2 with mpeg2 conversion (still using the mp4 and avi files I have, but using an mpeg2 conversion instead of an mp4 conversion) and see if that works. (I vaguely recall switching to mpg2 conversion when I first had my previous pc because of problems with mp4 conversion and then much later on switching back to mp4 conversion.)

Will I notice a big difference in HD quality on my 42" HDTV if I use mpg2 conversion instead of mp4 conversion? I usually like to watch my pc playthroughs on max settings on my big tv, so I want to have the best quality video on the b-r as possible.

I will also try copying a BD-R (using my new pc) that was originally done on my old pc that I know worked with sub-chapters and then burn a copy and see if it works.

Also, does it matter if I have my anti-virus software on while converting the video files? I used to turn it off on my old pc, but since it died out of the blue, I'm a little hesitant to do this with my new pc. So far, all the conversions I did were with it on.

I also just realized now that I hadn't selected a region for my B-R drive yet. I just set it up for USA region now. Could that cause the sub-chapter freezing problem?

BTW, the B-R drive on my new pc is new. I just got my pc a couple of weeks ago, since my old one died all of a sudden. I do, however, find it odd that the latest firmware for the drive is from 2011. Shouldn't there be a more recent update for this kind of drive?

One more question, since dvd-rs work with my DL-DVD burner drive, I think I can make my hd videos into avchd discs. Is the quality significantly different between B-R and Avchd converted video files? Also, can those be done on a dvd burner drive or do they need to be done on a Blu-ray burner drive (since they aren't exactly the same as regular video DVDs (I think))? Also, do I use ImgBurn or DVDDecrypter to burn an avchd dvd?

I'll let you know what happens with this attempts.

Thanks.

[jman98]

You have a LOT of questions! I don't have the patience to answer them all. But that is a great way for you to learn stuff by asking questions.

ImgBurn is NOT autoring software. It is BURNING software. Authoring makes your video+audio input into a format (DVD, BD) that complies with the specifications for that format. It's NOT your problem.

You can use MPEG-2 on BD, but you'll need a higher bit rate with it to match the same quality as H.264. If your source videos are standard def, MPEG-2 is probably good enough.

Your anti-virus should be OK and should not be the problem here.

The setting the region issue is not the problem here.

You shouldn't need to update the firmware at all on your burner unless you use crap media. LG, for example, rarely releases firmware updates for its drives so usually you're stuck with whatever it's at when you buy their burners.

AVCDH is basically BD format on DVD discs. BD burners are fully capable of burning to DVD discs, but only Taiyo Yuden and Verbatim (everything they make EXCEPT their cheap "Life" series is excellent) make quality DVD discs. And AVCHD is not always supported on BD players or supported in inconsistent ways between players. Oddly Sony supports it very well, which is strange given how anti-consumer they are.

It sounds to me like you just have issues with a very fussy player and that's your real problem. If you just can't live without it, you can look on the internet for information about changing the sensitivity of the laser. There is some risk involved in this and you could destroy your player. And some players are designed so that you as a consumer have no realistic way to do this. But I suppose it's possible that your player's drive is too picky and changing the sensitivity of the laser might be helpful here.

[KingKRool2002]

ok, thanks for the info.

[fritzi93]

The discs you're using are okay, if they're the ones linked in one of your earlier posts. If you burned the discs with ImgBurn and they verified okay, I think the problem must be elsewhere. Though you could do a surface scan to be doubly sure. A good transfer rate without any drastic slowdowns is what you want. I occasionally use OptiDriveControl, but it's not free. Maybe the latest version of Nero's DiscSpeed can scan Blu-Rays? Or maybe there's some other freeware program that can do it, I dunno.

Which leaves your authoring software or your burner. I'd try one of the alternative authoring programs listed in my previous post. Although it can't do menus, tsMuxer is very reliable, always assuming the problem isn't your player, which is still unclear.

I'd hesitate to buy another burner until other possibilities are exhausted.

Good luck.

[KingKRool2002]

Sorry I haven't posted back in awhile, my router broke. I'm pretty sure it's TME2 that is causing the problem. I've tried burning DVD-Rs on my b-r burner drive & on my dvd burner drive with both ImgBurn and DVD Decrypter and they work fine on my Blu-ray player.

I also tried buying a new Sony blu-ray player to see if the blu-rays would play on that player, but the same thing basically happens (except this time the track time increases as I fast-forward and the audio is at the correct spot, but the video is frozen at the part before I started fast-forwarding.)

I've also tried copying a Blu-ray (that was done on my old pc) on my new pc with ImgBurn and then burned it. I could skip chapters, but thethe main menu screen had weird garbled stuff over the bottom of it if I played a chapter/title from the last 3 ones on the disc. Also, the video glitched a bit when playing the last 3 titles.

I tried various trials of other b-r authoring software for my .mp4 and FRAPS recorded .avi video files, but they all crash during the authoring-process. I've tried Tsmuxer, AVCHDecoder, EasyBD, TME3, TMPGEnc, and Sony Movie Studio Platinum 12.0, but none of them work with the video files. Either the .mp4s or the .avis crash the program during conversion (or even just by trying to add them to the project). The files play fine on Windows Media Player and DivX Player, and TME2 plays them fine too, so I don't think anything is wrong with the actual files themselves. I installed ffdshow codecs and a TME3 codec update, but I'm wondering if I need another codec for the files?

Does anyone have any other suggestions for other b-r authoring software that can make either folder or .iso results? I'll try Nero and see if that works. I want to try a trial before buying a new b-r authoring software, since none of the trials I've tried have worked yet.

Any help with this stuff would be greatly appreciated. I'm not 100% sure it's TME2, since the copied b-r had some problems too, but I'm definitely leaning towards TME2 as the culprit.

Thanks.

[KingKRool2002]

Okay, I finally got everything working with Sony Movie Studio 12.0!

I just have 2 more questions:

(1) What is a good make/model for 50gb dl bd-r discs? (TDK was horrible)

(2) With Sony Movie Studio 12.0, does 1080 24p (24 fps) mess-up videos that were originally recorded at 29.97 fps? I thought the Blu-ray video looked a bit off (when I pause the video, for example, the 2 characters fighting have 3 arms moving at the same time instead of 1). Is this normal? Could I have accidentally turned on 3D in the Sony program by mistake? The video plays fine with DivX, so something must be wrong with the settings in Sony MS 12.0. Does anyone know what could cause this glitch?

Thanks for all the help, I really appreciate it.