Large .MKV (>19GB) files have audio cut out - out of ideas, help.

Spacy9

Spacy9

Scotch is my Lord and Savior
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I decided to start ripping my legally owned Blu-Ray and HD-DVD discs to my HTPC. I want to keep the same quality that is on the disc so I am not compressing the video, just the audio is compressed form DTS to AC3.

I have done 11 discs so far and they have all played beautifully, no issues at all. I looked at these files and they are all less than 19GB. Independence Day however is 28.3GB and giving me issues. The audio cuts out for short periods of time and I can't fast forward and rewind like I can with the other files. I'm trying to narrow down what my issue(s) with the larger .MKV files might be. Here is the hardware:

Multi Terabyte NAS with Gigabit NIC - running at Gigabit speed (verified)
24 Port Gigabit Switch.
HTPC - Intel Core 2 Due E4500 at stock 2.2Ghz, 2GB RAM, ATI 2600 PRO, Gigabit NIC - running at Gigabit speed (verified)

Using Windows Vista Home Premium 32bit, Windows Media Center with My Movies for playback. I have tried just playing it without My Movies and still have the same issue.

When I play one of the smaller files I see both CPUs go up to 80 to 90% utilization and Memory only shows 1.1GB used. When I play the larger file I see the same CPU utilization and memory Utilization as far as I can tell, it keeps crashing when I try to switch to the task manager with this larger file.

So I'm stumped - what piece is the bottleneck: CPU, Memory, Graphics Card? Anyone else playing these really large files with no issues?

Thanks for any feedback and sorry for the huge post.
 
Are you sure this isn't a problem with the way you encoded the audio? I'd first try remuxing with the audio straight off the disc and see if you still have the problem. I hardly see the point in re-encoding the audio anyway, it's such a small portion of the total size, but I guess that's your call.

My only other guess is that it's either not muxed properly (what tool are you using for this? try the latest mkvtoolnix?) or your network/disk isn't keeping up, but the bitrate is fairly low so that would indicate a pretty major issue.
 
u need to upgrade your videocard if u want hardware acceleration any 3 4 or 5 series card from ati
and any 8 9 and higher from nvidia.
 
MonkeyRoach said:
u need to upgrade your videocard if u want hardware acceleration any 3 4 or 5 series card from ati
and any 8 9 and higher from nvidia.
Click to expand...

Duh, actually, I didn't even notice this. The E4500 is insufficient for 1080p; when I was using one for software decoding I couldn't get 1080p to work even at much lower bitrates than you're running. Either upgrade your CPU or add a video card that can do hardware HD decoding.
 
Alright, I can buy the graphics card, but I don't understand why the smaller files sizes play just fine on my computer with no Hardware acceleration? Not trying to be a smart a$$ or anything, I really don't understand this part.

For software I'm using Any DVD to rip it to the HD.
EAC3TO to split out the files I want and convert the DTS to AC3
Then MKVMerge to MUX them back together again.
 
Far higher bitrate... the larger file size is a hint (assuming compression stays the same).

For some silly comparison :)
An AMD Neo single core can power through most 20GB blurays, but upon reaching the mega 30/40gb files...
It starts leaning on an extra graphics card (assuming installed).
 
jeremyshaw said:
Far higher bitrate... the larger file size is a hint (assuming compression stays the same).

For some silly comparison :)
An AMD Neo single core can power through most 20GB blurays, but upon reaching the mega 30/40gb files...
It starts leaning on an extra graphics card (assuming installed).
Click to expand...

Duh, that makes perfect sense... I have no idea why I didn't put the larger files size and larger bit rate together.
 
I have no problem decoding high bitrate (from 20Mb/s peaking at 60Mb/s) 1080p H264 streams with a CoreDuo T2500 using CoreAVC software decoder. Have you tried that?
 
File size is a useless way to base whether it can be played properly or not, especially considering the video's length (the 2nd part that matters) is never given.
 
It's a close way, though. I know my netbook's hdd craps out at bluray (mounted Image file), but that is definately a special case (and completely my fault). :(
 
dobieg2002 said:
The HD2600 can accelerate MKV, BD, MP4, etc.. just fine.

Download MPCHomeCinema stand alone filters:
http://sourceforge.net/projects/mpc...ndalone Filters.1.3.1249.0.(x86).zip/download

Extract the MPCVideoDec.ax to a folder on your local system.

regsvr32.exe "%path%\MPCVideoDec.ax"

If you are using ffdshow, disable H.264/AVC

Enjoy lower CPU utilization and smooth playback.
Click to expand...

This worked! No new hardware, just changed CODECs and it plays flawlessly now no audio drop outs at all. Thank you!
 
Final question, how do I make sure that the ATI HD 2600 is actually decoding the video and taking the load off the CPU? Is there a setting somewhere that I need to adjust or does it just do it automatically?
 
Check in task manager?

If you are using MPC-HC, when a file is playing, right click ->filter ->MPC Video Decoder. If DXNA is on, then it's working it's magic!
 
Task Manager shoudl show lower CPU utilization
Catalyst Control Center in the Overclocking tab should show GPU usage, or download GPUZ which also shows GPU utilization.
 
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