Copy HD Recordings and keeping surround sound

Roger Dowling

Roger Dowling

Member
I've searched but can't find a solution to this specific problem which is as follows: If I copy an HD file which has a DolbyD sound track across my network from the hummy to a NAS (after decrypting, and including all sidecar files) and then try and play it either via the hummy or via a media player, the sound is merely stereo (sounds like all tracks though). If I play the file from the NAS on a PC (using VLC) and interrogate the media info it is reported that the sound track is 3F2R/LFE which changes to stereo when there are ad breaks (as expected). Listening to the sound on a PC (with just an ordinary stereo sound card), all I can hear is the FL and FR with center, rear and LFE missing. Can anybody explain what I am doing wrong and is there a way to play the file stored on the NAS to a TV and with the correct sound?
 
BH : For information: the sidecar files have no relevance to this.
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As far as playing the file on the Humax goes, the sidecar files are very relevant. If you have a recording with a DD5.1 soundtrack and you remove (or rename) the *.HMT file, the *.TS will only play back in PCM 48K stereo. So if you play the *.TS file remotely from your NAS to the Humax, it will not have access to the *.HMT file and will output PCM 48K stereo audio. The *.HMT sidecar file is required to enable the Humax to output DD5.1 audio when playing a *.TS file, if however the file is converted to say a stand alone AVI or MKV file the Humax will output any DD5.1 present in the recording
 
Okay Ezra, I understand what you are saying and I have kept all sidecar files with the main *.ts file as they are all very small so it's not a big deal. *.hmt, *.nts and *.thm are present in the folder on the NAS so are you saying that the Humax can't access these files (or doesn't know where to look) when playing the *.ts from the NAS? I haven't tried converting the *.ts file to a standalone file but I'll check that out. That's a bit of a pain though as the purpose of this exercise was just to move whole series off the Humax that we hadn't had time to watch to free some disk space for other stuff and time to do all the conversion is what is lacking!!!!
 
Ezra Pound said:
As far as playing the file on the Humax goes, the sidecar files are very relevant...
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I stand corrected - I had no idea about that. I expected that if the .ts contained a surround sound stream it would be simply passed on as a surround sound stream on the HDMI (unless the menu settings are stereo). Why the heck?? Is there a PCM soundtrack in the .ts alongside the Dolby track? If not, why go to the trouble of decoding and re-encoding the audio track?

Weird.

Obviously how the "media player" mentioned in the OP renders the soundtrack is the responsibility of that media player, but if the OP accesses a NAS (say) by DLNA from the Humax (Media >> Storage (blue) >> Network) then obviously the .hmt data is not being accessed. The only way to do this from the Humax is to set up a network-shares-automount - then you will access the NAS via Media >> Storage (blue) >> USB.
 
Roger Dowling said:
Okay Ezra, I understand what you are saying...
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See post 5 (in preparation when you posted post 4). Mounting the NAS instead of accessing it by DLNA fools the Humax into thinking it is local storage, and everything works just as if the recording is on a USB drive (which is an alternative for you - just store your archived recordings on a portable drive plugged into the Humax).
 
Roger Dowling said:
so are you saying that the Humax can't access these files
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Yes, the Humax needs the files to be in the same folder as the *.TS file on a local drive, if the sidecar files are held on a NAS only the *.TS is 'sent' to the Humax. The automount works by fooling the Humax into seeing complete folders as if they were local. Converting the *.TS to AVI or MKV removes the need for the info. contained in the *.HMT file and when played locally on the Humax is capable of outputting DD5.1, however the Humax accepts fewer file types / formats for playing if the file is 'remote' so there is still a chance that a working *.AVI or *.MKV DD5.1 file that plays locally may not 'stream', this problem would not arise when using Network Shares Automount
 
I'm much obliged for this info and remain totally awed by the people who run this forum and maintain the CFW with associated packages.
 
I don't know why people are talking about Dolby, there is no Dolby Digital sound of any sort on Freeview SD or HD. On Freeview SD the stereo sound is MP2 (MPEG 1 Layer 2). On Freeview HD the sound is AAC, sometimes 2.0 channels and sometimes 5.1.

The only place Dolby Digital comes in is because most home cinema amps can't decode AAC, the HDR Fox T2 transcodes the AAC to Dolby Digital before outputting it over optical. I'm not sure what happens over HDMI, the AAC could be transcoded to multichannel LPCM or it could still be Dolby Digital.

Similarly depending on your NAS software the NAS might be transcoding the sound, whereas when you play the file locally you will be getting the raw AAC. But VLC can play AAC so it ought to work.
 
Owen Smith said:
I don't know why people are talking about Dolby, there is no Dolby Digital sound of any sort on Freeview SD or HD.
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I suppose it's similar to someone talking about a Hoover when they mean a vacuum cleaner. The name Dolby has become synonymous with any sort of surround sound.
 
I only keep the ts files on my NAS but play them back on XBMC which can decode the 5.1 AAC and output PCM in full surround.
 
raydon said:
I suppose it's similar to someone talking about a Hoover when they mean a vacuum cleaner. The name Dolby has become synonymous with any sort of surround sound.
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Yes... but in my case it's because of lack of experience with surround.
 
Whilst I can get VLC to play a decrypted HD file on a networked Hummy, XBMC doesn't even see the files (although folders are shown). I can't find a way of playing fullscreen onto a normal TV (via HDMI) using VLC and I don't want it to look like a large PC (or Linux in this case). XBMC plays full screen TS files transferred from another Hummy on a network drive but I really need to do it directly from the Humax to avoid time consuming transfers. Any ideas on this score please?
 
I think I've tried both ways with the same result, only folders display in XBMC. I can play files via DLNA from another Hummy (ie Hummy to Hummy) although I still have to sort the surround issues with automount. On Linux, Banshee displays the files but I can't select them to play. VLC plays them but with the restrictions that it has to look like a PC.
 
I know what you said before, but first you must be sure that the HiDef recording is decrypted (playing by network file share) or auto-unprotected (for streaming by DLNA/UPnP). Neither of these is required for streaming Humax-Humax. See Things Every... (click) section 5 (and follow the link) for details.

As long as the file really is decrypted, I see no reason why XBMC would not play it by file share (all you need is the nfs-utils package installed on the source HDR-FOX to make your Linux system see it on the network, or samba if you want to co-exist with Windows). In this configuration, XBMC should see no difference between a local-stored file and one that happens to be stored on a network-connected drive (ie the Humax).
 
All of my HDR Fox T2 video content, both SD and unencrypted HD plays on my PC using XBMC. Just had to select it as a video source via the "UPnP Devices" option in XBMC. If you install Mediatomb you can add that as a video source in the same way and that works too. No need for NFS or Samba.
 
Okay thanks. I didn't realise that there was a difference between auto-unprotect or decrypt manually. I've got auto unprotect running and just had a look at the files which are show DEC on the file I did manually before I installed auto unprotect but on a file after this installation I have the option to decrypt manually still. Package nfs-utils is not installed either so I'll do that. I obviously need to experiment more and I'll recheck that excellent Wiki and Things Every...... doc.

Many thanks again................
 
I'll also retry Mediatomb but when I tried that I couldn't see any files listed - maybe I hadn't got everything setup correctly.
 
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