Probably a dumb question... Why can't Kodi play .mka contained files along with a .cue file?
Atmos Experiences, Frustrations and a Plea for Help
- Thread starter quoddiophile
- Start date
Help Support QuadraphonicQuad:
Atmos m4a files are for reasons I don't understand sometimes problematic to play in either VLC or PowerDVD; other times not. Have not figured this out yet. Usually a reboot fixes this, so I don't know what is going on in Windows. I keep a close check on the Windows Sound properties to make sure the AVR is recognized.
Since I'm using my older AVR while waiting for Onkyo to send me a replacement RZ50, not sure...maybe it's the AVR. This stuff seems so hit or miss sometimes. Other times things move along just fine for a week, m4a playback is fine, until it isn't.
Someone mentioned in an earlier post about frames per second. Haven't done much with cue files recently but should be 75 fps or 1000 ms. I have a spreadsheet to take care of all that around somewhere.
Since I'm using my older AVR while waiting for Onkyo to send me a replacement RZ50, not sure...maybe it's the AVR. This stuff seems so hit or miss sometimes. Other times things move along just fine for a week, m4a playback is fine, until it isn't.
Someone mentioned in an earlier post about frames per second. Haven't done much with cue files recently but should be 75 fps or 1000 ms. I have a spreadsheet to take care of all that around somewhere.
Out of interest... Are these from 'lossy' or 'lossless' Atmos sources?
All 'lossless' Atmos sources (from Blu-ray disc based media) will have included a mandatory 'lossy' Dolby Digital core. Has this core been removed prior to re-muxing into the .m4a (mp4) container (usually by muxing into the Matroska container first) or do they still include the core?
Just lossless.
Some of these are other files converted to wav, the re encoded to Atmos lossless, 7.1.4.
EDIT: Well I'm sure some are definitely lossy only.
Has the lossy Dolby Digital stream been removed?
This takes me back to the early days of remuxing Dolby TrueHD audio streams into the Matroska (.mkv or .mka) container. Often the playback device would not be able to 'parse' the audio stream and often require re-booting! By contrast, there were never any problem playing Dolby TrueHD audio streams when they were kept within their .m2ts (transport stream) container.
Normally if it's a BD then I would use makeMKV and extract only the lossless stream.
For "other files" e.g. mpeg-h I would first convert to wav suitable for 7.1.4 then re encode to Atmos.
Do you configure MakeMKV to save the files into the .mkv container or are you selecting its 'backup' option?
I would point out, FWIW, with creating an mkv I normally do this after I ext ract an .iso file. Then when time permits I open the .iso in makeMKV and extract the desired (lossless) stream.
I use MAKEMKV exclusively for ripping Blu Rays, never a problem.
Assuming the Blu Ray has a variety of listening choices, stereo, 5.1, ATMOS, just to keep my answer simple.
It rips as what I call the root file, which is the MKV file.
Then I use Music Media Helper to select the 5.1 or stereo into FLAC lossless chapters, or tracks as you might call them, then tag and listen, very simple.
As my only goal is to get whatever I play, to play via JRiver player.
The Atmos lossless file, I split into MKV file chapters assuming it is not a gapless album as as of this writing JRiver will not playback gapless MKV chapters, it will playback FLAC gapless albums.
So my workaround, for instance Abbey Road/Beatles, I just include the root MKV file, and being that it also has the video with it, I can see name of song while I am listening if I choose to have screen on.
Between my rig, JRiver, MakeMKV and Music Media Helper, I get to listen to the highest available ripped source and I rarely have a listening problem, when I do, it is always a mistake I made.
Assuming the Blu Ray has a variety of listening choices, stereo, 5.1, ATMOS, just to keep my answer simple.
It rips as what I call the root file, which is the MKV file.
Then I use Music Media Helper to select the 5.1 or stereo into FLAC lossless chapters, or tracks as you might call them, then tag and listen, very simple.
As my only goal is to get whatever I play, to play via JRiver player.
The Atmos lossless file, I split into MKV file chapters assuming it is not a gapless album as as of this writing JRiver will not playback gapless MKV chapters, it will playback FLAC gapless albums.
So my workaround, for instance Abbey Road/Beatles, I just include the root MKV file, and being that it also has the video with it, I can see name of song while I am listening if I choose to have screen on.
Between my rig, JRiver, MakeMKV and Music Media Helper, I get to listen to the highest available ripped source and I rarely have a listening problem, when I do, it is always a mistake I made.
Can you play Atmos encoded m4a files? Or is it always mkv?
That's a great question.
Using the software (Music Media Helper) I can convert a MKV file to m4a, it is just that I choose not to.
In my very personal set up, I prefer the MKV file as I am used to it now and not interested in a lot of experimenting.
Keeping in mind ALL of my music no matter what it is, goes and plays via JRiver.
quoddiophile
Well-known Member
Well, after quite a few hours of mostly fruitless endeavour, I have decided to give up on using the Kodi/Nvidia shield pro to play my Atmos files. I will revert to playing my files using my Oppo 205 player. Although that setup can be bit clunky, at least it plays the files on a consistent basis and will generally display the basic information that I need. The major drawback is it won’t play gapless albums properly but in that case it is much easier just use the physical disc rather than monkey around with Kodi.
The straw that broke the camel’s back was when I tried playing Loreena McKennitt’s “The Visit” and the Tragically Hip’s “Fully Completely”. In both cases there was sound but the screen was black. After considerable digging, I discovered that Kodi does not use the Matroska spec of 600 pixels for the artwork; it uses 500 pixels (why?). Changing the picture size accordingly did bring up the display and indeed it also even displayed the track listing the way I wanted. Indeed it even appeared to be doing exactly what I wanted it to do. I then played the files but after the first track, it refused to play and would simply cycle rapidly through the rest of the tracks. Enough is enough! At that point, I quite literally pulled the plug and returned the Nvidia shield pro for a refund.
The behaviour mentioned above makes it appear that I did not have the passthrough setting enabled. I did not think at the time to actually check but I am absolutely certain that I had enabled it properly in response to Pat Bateman’s post. I certainly did not change after that. If the setting had somehow got changed on its own then, that would suggest another serious problem that I am simply not prepared to deal with.
As an aside, if I have read this correctly on the Kodi site, it looks like you are supposed to use only M4A files. However, MKA files seemed to work as well, albeit to a limited extent in my setup.
I have to say that Kodi is probably the worst app that I have ever used. I am not going to waste anyone’s time by listing the numerous problems and deficiencies that I encountered; instead I will give you one minor but illustrative example. It seems that there is no easy way to get to the settings icon; rather you have to numerous key presses to get there. Most apps have the settings icon quite handy.
I want to thank everyone for their help. I have learned a number of useful things along the way that should help me in the future. The ultimate solution is probably if an outfit like Roon (which I use and, for the most part, like) can incorporate Atmos into its system. If FLAC could somehow be used for over 8 channels that would be really good as well.
The straw that broke the camel’s back was when I tried playing Loreena McKennitt’s “The Visit” and the Tragically Hip’s “Fully Completely”. In both cases there was sound but the screen was black. After considerable digging, I discovered that Kodi does not use the Matroska spec of 600 pixels for the artwork; it uses 500 pixels (why?). Changing the picture size accordingly did bring up the display and indeed it also even displayed the track listing the way I wanted. Indeed it even appeared to be doing exactly what I wanted it to do. I then played the files but after the first track, it refused to play and would simply cycle rapidly through the rest of the tracks. Enough is enough! At that point, I quite literally pulled the plug and returned the Nvidia shield pro for a refund.
The behaviour mentioned above makes it appear that I did not have the passthrough setting enabled. I did not think at the time to actually check but I am absolutely certain that I had enabled it properly in response to Pat Bateman’s post. I certainly did not change after that. If the setting had somehow got changed on its own then, that would suggest another serious problem that I am simply not prepared to deal with.
As an aside, if I have read this correctly on the Kodi site, it looks like you are supposed to use only M4A files. However, MKA files seemed to work as well, albeit to a limited extent in my setup.
I have to say that Kodi is probably the worst app that I have ever used. I am not going to waste anyone’s time by listing the numerous problems and deficiencies that I encountered; instead I will give you one minor but illustrative example. It seems that there is no easy way to get to the settings icon; rather you have to numerous key presses to get there. Most apps have the settings icon quite handy.
I want to thank everyone for their help. I have learned a number of useful things along the way that should help me in the future. The ultimate solution is probably if an outfit like Roon (which I use and, for the most part, like) can incorporate Atmos into its system. If FLAC could somehow be used for over 8 channels that would be really good as well.
Sure. I get it. My interest goes beyond extracting mkv and various audio formats from BD's, which is not hard.
Getting playback on various software players from various container formats can be challenging at times. mkv is more generally accepted, and I'm OK with that. I just like to know why things don't work. Many people I know prefer m4a for it's compact size, me, well, it's not about space with me because I have plenty and prefer .iso playback anyway.
JRiver I just don't know anything about. Kodi I just plain don't like.
None of the software players are perfect. If we could wrap up DVDA/SACD/BD etc etc bitstreaming from one player it would be sweet. Don't see it happening soon, so we will have our preferences. I'm good with whatever works for each person.
Anyone have problems with just Atmos playback of Beatles (AbbeyRoad and LetItBe) as the only ones that have stuttering issues?
I use makeMKV and MMH to created either a full album .mkv or individual track .mka files. I played DSOTM flawlessly the other day but when I try the Beatles stuff it plays for a few seconds and then stutters? Maybe it is the bitrate that the system is choking on? I use VLC from my PC to an Onkyo AVR via a HDMI connection with passthrough enabled.
I use makeMKV and MMH to created either a full album .mkv or individual track .mka files. I played DSOTM flawlessly the other day but when I try the Beatles stuff it plays for a few seconds and then stutters? Maybe it is the bitrate that the system is choking on? I use VLC from my PC to an Onkyo AVR via a HDMI connection with passthrough enabled.
Abbey Road has a huge bitrate around 16Mbps, the average Atmos mix is around 6Mbps.
Try a new high speed or 4K HDMI cable.
Edit: Kodi had problems with Abbey Rd until a fix about 18 moths ago. Maybe VLC was never fixed?
Try a new high speed or 4K HDMI cable.
Edit: Kodi had problems with Abbey Rd until a fix about 18 moths ago. Maybe VLC was never fixed?
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It’s mainly because it can be easily tagged, just like FLAC, and can hold Atmos and TrueHD codecs. The downside is this feature (codec support) is relatively new and some application/players can’t playback. JRiver was one a couple years ago, not sure if it now supports M4A with Atmos. Old BD players like Oppos don’t recognise Atmos in M4A either.
It can. But you need to remove the chapters from the MKA file. The cue file must have identical name to the MKA file (name without the extension must be identical). Kodi then uses the cue instead of scanning the MKA for chapters.
Kodi plays gapless Atmos from mka files with a CUE file. (See previous post).
All you need is any size png or jpg named: folder.png or folder.jpg for Kodi in the album folder to display the album art during playback.
For Atmos and TrueHD using M4A allows those files to be easily tagged and read into the Kodi music library (database). If you use m4a files with tagged album art Kodi displays that also.
If you’d used M4A for your Atmos albums you wouldn’t have had so many issues
EDIT: Kodi does not read tags from MKV or MKA files for music, that’s why users need cue files for mka files. Matroska tags are very different to other tagging systems and most apps don’t read or write them.
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