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Need Help with AS Output (.MP4). What are others doing with them?

As long as the streaming provider offers other audio tracks, anystream will list them too. There's usually entries for AC3 (dolby digital) or DTS too on most titles.

The only 5.1 is all EAC3 on my end. The other offerings are stereo. Only difference in choice is the KBPS of the audio.
 
Thank you for all the comments.

I realized lying in bed last night the main problem I have (that I didn't mention above) is that my amp cannot play the EAC3 audio - so I cannot get 5.1 without tweaking the file. My editor does that, but it kills the embedded subtitle files within the .mp4. Some of the videos do need subs.

Further, I am used to chapters. I tweak all my shows etc by adding chapters after the title sequence / previously on segments so that I don't have to watch them again and again. Bang...push the chapter button and you jump over it. Without chapters in the .mp4, you can't do that. Kodi only seeks a specific timeframe step. Makes the whole process of finding the exact point quite tedious. MP4 does do chapters supposedly, but the tools I have to create chapters only works with other formats (namely DVD & BD >> MKV). I also like to remove credits / logos, which saves a huge amount of space on the HDD's. I guess I also only want a single file to deal with.

These are all the things I have been used to. I'm an oldie, so dealing with change is difficult, and the brain no longer works like it once did. Learning is slow :(

Yes...the MP4's play on my HTPC as is. I'd like a new amp, but funds are scarce. Tweaking the file is the only way I get 5.1 in the current setup. MKVToolNIx does NOT show the embedded subtitle files.

I figured perhaps someone here had a way of dealing with these things when starting with a MP4. I've never had to deal with MP4's before, so I was hopeful.

Many thanks.


That's precisely why I asked what the actual problem was... The solution to your problems is rather simple: use ffmpeg! You can create a chapter mark file by hand in plaintext and add marks as you wish [1], you can also transcode audio to whatever your player copes with (but don't use ffmpeg's native aac coder, unless it's vastly improved recently, use fdk's one), you can even keep the original track and a worse track in the same file; something along the lines of:-

Code:
ffmpeg -i input_file.ext -map 0:v -map 0:a -map 0:a -c:v copy -c:a:0 copy -c:a:1 ac3 -b:a 640k out_file.mp4

(note the two -map 0:a, it's not a typo) will take the input file, copy the first video track, the first audio track, also copy the first audio track to the second audio track encoding it using ac3 at 640kbps, and if the player is good enough it will pick the audio track it could play (I had to do similar with DTS because my iPad Pro won't play that). If you want subtitles, throw in a

Code:
-map 0:s -c:s copy


Code:
1. https://ffmpeg.org/ffmpeg-formats.html#Metadata-1
 
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My system has more . My gaming/video/htpc/Plex server rig has 37TB :p

Sent from my Pixel 3 XL using Tapatalk

<bragging>

I now have > 160TB of storage protected by Snapraid (3 parity drives, each 10TB) in a 4U rack mount drive array. 24 bays not quite filled with 10TB server class drives. The media server itself is a 1U server (multi processor, 32 cores total) and 96GB ram running Ubuntu 18 LTS but thinking of moving to Elementary OS.

We do whole disc backups - UHD and BD, and use JRiver Media Center which supports full menus, as well as direct access to individual play lists (mpls files) for bypassing menu stuff. Also full support for MVC/SBS/TAB 3D. Seriously is the most complete media player solution out there. But a bit of a bear to configure.

The result is that we have so much purchased/backed up content it would take years to watch it all. But given that things are starting to disappear due to cancel culture, we’re feeling like we need to start hoarding as much as we can, and get around to watching it later.

Anyway - it’s a sweet setup into a large LG OLED set (2016 - the last of the 3D TVs).

We used Plex at one time, but since JRiver fixed their streaming to JRemote (iOS and Android app) for video, dropped Plex. I like full disc backups as well; that way I can create whatever version I need with or without quality loss (compression) for whatever need I have. And I now watch a lot of extras that I didn’t when I just ripped to MKV.

The disk space consumed is pretty staggering, but storage is cheap.

The wonderful thing about AS is that at least I can grab the best quality browser-based streaming has to offer without re-encode; sadly that means limited on the other goodies like 4K, HDR, etc... But it’s been a fairly perfect solution for NF and AP. Consider the $100 money well spent
 
Damn, looks like imma need to swap that 4tb drive i have our with a 10 or 14tb one to beat you

Sent from my Pixel 3 XL using Tapatalk
 
Mines a dedicated server used purely as a plex streaming server. its just 46% full at the moment but now ive got AS...
Also but I use Emby live and Plex as backup.
140TB (RAID5 plus hotspares) and counting (with everything backed up twice so 3x that overall...)
And I see people on the forums who have many times more than this.
I do have a strong preference for mkv, and I do convert everything to mkv, sometimes cleaning up along the way.
 
Again...thank you for the comments.

@0x0x0x0x0 ...wow, I'll be back to school to get a PhD :) Never used that prog. Seen it mentioned plenty time though, and it comes under the hood of a lot of stuff these days (thinking Blender). (Can you explain what this means "use fdk's one" - the fdk part? Not sure what that is.

@Steve55 ...found that last night. Need to experiment. The problem with subs (srt files) is that if I cut the video (to remove logos eg) the srt file is no longer the correct length for the subs to be in the correct spot. So much to learn. Guess I'd have to learn how to offset it. Any paid programs that do everything??

Lots of reading in my future. Many thanks.
 
<bragging>

I now have > 160TB of storage protected by Snapraid (3 parity drives, each 10TB) in a 4U rack mount drive array. 24 bays not quite filled with 10TB server class drives. The media server itself is a 1U server (multi processor, 32 cores total) and 96GB ram running Ubuntu 18 LTS but thinking of moving to Elementary OS.


Now we're talking about some serious storage, I recon mine is just over 500TB (>3/4 are SAS). But in my years of computer experience, and in doing data recovery in the past, I've learnt one thing, so most of them are offline. Why? I never ever access all of that in any one time, and it's a waste of electricity and mechanical wear on the disks. RAID only makes sense when I need to rip a bunch of discs (think series) and the ripping bandwidth exceeds that of one HDD, so I throw in a RAID0 and as soon as the discs are dumped, copy RAID0 onto single disks and bring them offline. Of course having a decent SAS controller with a decent backplane helps. My recent spree was when A was having dump-sale on WDC's external 14TBs so I got six at a stupidly low price that worked out circa 15 eur per TB :coffee:
 
<snip>

@0x0x0x0x0 ...wow, I'll be back to school to get a PhD :) Never used that prog. Seen it mentioned plenty time though, and it comes under the hood of a lot of stuff these days (thinking Blender). (Can you explain what this means "use fdk's one" - the fdk part? Not sure what that is.

<snip>

It's this:
Code:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fraunhofer_FDK_AAC

but are you on windows or linux or what?
 
The only 5.1 is all EAC3 on my end. The other offerings are stereo. Only difference in choice is the KBPS of the audio.

Can your amp play AC3 (quick hint: if you can play audio from DVDs the amp is likely to do AC3), if so just transcode to ac3 instead of e-ac3 ;)
 
Can your amp play AC3 (quick hint: if you can play audio from DVDs the amp is likely to do AC3), if so just transcode to ac3 instead of e-ac3 ;)

Thanks for the link. I'm on windows. My amp plays AC3 quite happily (and DTS), but it's too old for the latest formats on BD. That link says that fdk is for android, which I guess means it doesn't work on windows? Most of this stuff is way above my pay grade ;). I use powerdirector currently. It does convert the EAC3 to AC3, but it kills the embedded subs. Need to figure that part (probably need an SRT file) so I can drop it into the prog before writing out to BD (So I can get chapters etc). PD is very fast at creating the new files. Learning a new work flow is always taxing.

Appreciate the help.
 
Thanks for the link. I'm on windows. My amp plays AC3 quite happily (and DTS), but it's too old for the latest formats on BD. That link says that fdk is for android, which I guess means it doesn't work on windows? Most of this stuff is way above my pay grade ;). I use powerdirector currently. It does convert the EAC3 to AC3, but it kills the embedded subs. Need to figure that part (probably need an SRT file) so I can drop it into the prog before writing out to BD (So I can get chapters etc). PD is very fast at creating the new files. Learning a new work flow is always taxing.

Appreciate the help.


You can compile it for windows, but why bother if you can have a much better ac3, just grab a copy of ffmpeg from
Code:
https://www.gyan.dev/ffmpeg/builds/

& voila! ;)

incidentally, if you need to de-embed subs:-

Code:
ffmpeg -i input_file.mp4 -map 0:s output_file.srt

should do the trick.

incidentally #2 ( :p ) if it's an external player that outputs to an amp you might want to make the ac3 track default, I'm sure you can figure out how to do it, but I'll give you a hint: you want to look up 'disposition' option. :)
 
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You can compile it for windows, but why bother if you can have a much better ac3, just grab a copy of ffmpeg from
Code:
https://www.gyan.dev/ffmpeg/builds/

& voila! ;)

incidentally, if you need to de-embed subs:-

Code:
ffmpeg -i input_file.mp4 -map 0:s output_file.srt

should do the trick.

incidentally #2 ( :p ) if it's an external player that outputs to an amp you might want to make the ac3 track default, I'm sure you can figure out how to do it, but I'll give you a hint: you want to look up 'disposition' option. :)

Many, many thanks. I'll get onto this as soon as I can.

It looks like ffmpeg is a cmd line program - hence all the code. That'll make my brain hurt :D

Which version of ffMPEG should I use?? There are 4 versions at that link?
 
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Many, many thanks. I'll get onto this as soon as I can.

It looks like ffmpeg is a cmd line program - hence all the code. That'll make my brain hurt :D

Once you get used to it, you'll be looking back and thinking that you've been wasting all that time scrolling and moving the mouse trying to hit the right checkbox ;)

Which version of ffMPEG should I use?? There are 4 versions at that link?

Just get the release-full unless you fancy experimental features, in which case, get git-full.
 
I will add - drives fail, and rebuilding even a 4 TB drive takes F O R E V E R. Or a really really long time.
Now we're talking about some serious storage, I recon mine is just over 500TB (>3/4 are SAS). But in my years of computer experience, and in doing data recovery in the past, I've learnt one thing, so most of them are offline. Why? I never ever access all of that in any one time, and it's a waste of electricity and mechanical wear on the disks. RAID only makes sense when I need to rip a bunch of discs (think series) and the ripping bandwidth exceeds that of one HDD, so I throw in a RAID0 and as soon as the discs are dumped, copy RAID0 onto single disks and bring them offline. Of course having a decent SAS controller with a decent backplane helps. My recent spree was when A was having dump-sale on WDC's external 14TBs so I got six at a stupidly low price that worked out circa 15 eur per TB :coffee:

Yep on the power consumption. The drives spin down when not in use which helps on power consumption and wear and tear. Snapraid is kind of a hybrid raid/backup solution (it’s not striped at all, can use any filesystem or drive size excepting that the parity drives need to be >= the largest data drive). It also doesn’t support extended attributes on extfs or other file systems, but I don’t use that for my media; using a mix of ext4 and xfs. The other issue I had was of course heat management - the array has 4 power supplies in it with some powerful fans. That took the drive temps down from 50-70C to a much more safe 25-30C on average. Was really worried about that...

Well off topic now in this thread, but interesting to hear what other “archivists” are doing. I still buy as much physical media as I can as the quality is simply better than any streaming; but AS is great for those things that never come out on Bluray/UHD.
 
Once you get used to it, you'll be looking back and thinking that you've been wasting all that time scrolling and moving the mouse trying to hit the right checkbox ;)



Just get the release-full unless you fancy experimental features, in which case, get git-full.

Nah...I start slow (like my brain). Is it an installer, or does the exe run as a portable?
 
Nah...I start slow (like my brain). Is it an installer, or does the exe run as a portable?

It's a protable: extract it to the place you want to have run it from (you literally just need the ffmpeg.exe from the archive, the rest is some presets and documentation). But you first need to download and install 7Zip, which is like arguably one of the best compression programs and it's free ;)
 
I will add - drives fail, and rebuilding even a 4 TB drive takes F O R E V E R. Or a really really long time.


Yep on the power consumption. The drives spin down when not in use which helps on power consumption and wear and tear. Snapraid is kind of a hybrid raid/backup solution (it’s not striped at all, can use any filesystem or drive size excepting that the parity drives need to be >= the largest data drive). It also doesn’t support extended attributes on extfs or other file systems, but I don’t use that for my media; using a mix of ext4 and xfs. The other issue I had was of course heat management - the array has 4 power supplies in it with some powerful fans. That took the drive temps down from 50-70C to a much more safe 25-30C on average. Was really worried about that...

Well off topic now in this thread, but interesting to hear what other “archivists” are doing. I still buy as much physical media as I can as the quality is simply better than any streaming; but AS is great for those things that never come out on Bluray/UHD.

Perhaps we should move this part of the discussion to Hardware or General Chat so as to not hijack the thread, @Ch3vr0n: can you selectively move posts in the forum or is it the full thread or none at all?
 
TI realized lying in bed last night the main problem I have (that I didn't mention above) is that my amp cannot play the EAC3 audio - so I cannot get 5.1 without tweaking the file. My editor does that, but it kills the embedded subtitle files within the .mp4. Some of the videos do need subs.

If you get something like Plex then you don't have to worry about tweaking the file. It'll automatically convert the audio stream over to something that your device can play. I have several videos with EAC3 audio and it converts it and plays it on the unsupported devices easily.

With that said I've been grabbing my AS videos with 2.0 audio and probably should've been doing 5.1. Might go back at some point and redo them when I have more "tokens"
 
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