Remux .mov into .mkv (with ffmpeg - or something else)

[HoraceMcMahon]

I have an .mov with H264/AVC encoded video and LPCM uncompressed 6 channel audio. I want to remux into an MKV - obviously with no reencoding.

I tried this using mkvtoolnix. An older version allowed me to remux the video into mkv, but the audio was not recognized. I tried using the newest version and couldn't even open the .mov in the program.

I figured ffmpeg command line was my best option. Demux into video and audio streams, and then use mkvtoolnix to mux the streams. I am brand new to ffmpeg, but I'm doing my best with bits and pieces learned online.

I used the code

ffmpeg -i "input.mov" -vcodec copy -an "output.h264"

But the finished file is not recognized by mkvtoolnix. I know it's an H264 encoded stream, but I don't know for sure what the file extension should be.

This bothers me about ffmpeg command line. You seem to have to specify the file extension by the output file's file extension. What if I don't know what the file extension should be? Should an AVC/H264 stream be .264 or .h264 or .avc or .avc1? Should lpcm be .wav?

I figure there's a simpler way to do this, either via ffmpeg or some other utility.

Thanks all.

[KarMa]

If the audio is DTS HD, then it is compressed and not LPCM. Just with DTS HD it's losslessly compressed, so nothing is lost.

You may try tsMuxer GUI, as it can demux the video from my .MOV files produced from my small camera. The .MOV files contain H.264 with PCM mono. Just be sure to use the "Demux" for output. For whatever reason it can't demux the PCM mono audio. Also I have no problem using mkvtoolnix with .MOV files so I don't know. Maybe your video files have a variable framerate which can cause all kinds of havoc.

[HoraceMcMahon]

Thanks for your reply, KarMa. It is uncompressed LPCM. (It was once DTS HD, but it's now uncompressed LPCM - edited the OP to clarify.)

I did try tsMuxerGUI. It seems like it should have worked, see no reason why it won't (tried both the newest version and an older one), but I get an error when trying to import the mov. There's no text to the error, just a small notification screen with as big 'X' icon and no text.

[KarMa]

MP4Box GUI also works well with .MOV files, even though you would think it's only for .MP4s. I can demux my .MOV files fine with it.

There is a problem with that program sometimes getting stuck on the toolbar, and never popping up. I get this problem sometimes on my Win7 machine. But I have a work around if needed.

[poisondeathray]

Did you try ffmpeg to mux directly ?

ffmpeg -i "input.mov" -c:v copy -c:a copy "output.mkv"

[pandy]

@setlocal
@if not exist %cd%\mkv (mkdir %cd%\mkv)
@for %%1 in (*.*) do (ffmpeg.exe -y -i "%%1" -c copy -f matroska "%cd%\mkv\%%~n1.mkv")
@pause