Problems playing MKA files

[ngs428]

Try putting Output configuration to "Optimized" in Audio settings.

That must be the default setting. It was already at that unfortunately.

Edit: at least my flac files are gapless.

 

[himey]

That must be the default setting. It was already at that unfortunately.

Edit: at least my flac files are gapless.

I just tried it on my Onn UHD device. It is an Android TV like the Shield. Both Abbey Road and INXS KICK play gapless with MKA files.

Ripped to MKV using MakeMKV. MKV to MKA using MMH. Tagged using MP3TAG.

I am stumped. M4A files using the same process do not play gapless which is why I use MKA. Kodi playback with the PlexKodiConnect add-on.

Edit...How are you splitting the MKV/MKA?

 

[ngs428]

I just tried it on my Onn UHD device. It is an Android TV like the Shield. Both Abbey Road and INXS KICK play gapless with MKA files.

Ripped to MKV using MakeMKV. MKV to MKA using MMH. Tagged using MP3TAG.

I am stumped. M4A files using the same process do not play gapless which is why I use MKA. Kodi playback with the PlexKodiConnect add-on.

Edit...How are you splitting the MKV/MKA?

Thanks for the additional testing. Not sure what the issue is here.
I am splitting the mkv using MMH now that the program fix was made. My process is the same as yours. Makemkv (selecting the atmos/truehd track only). Feed that mkv to MMH to split by chapter to get the final MKA.

I used mkvtoolnix before mmh to split and it worked well and actually gave the same output now that mmh is fixed. I have used mkv toolnix for a while so I was familiar with that.

So, yes I am splitting with MMH.

I am tagging with mp3tag using the musicbrainz source. It is a bit tedious but works.

Thanks again for the help and giving me a little push to get Kodi running.

 

[dabl]

Visiting this thread trying to get Plex on an Nvidia Shield TV Pro 2019 to play MKA Atmos files which isn't working.

According to this Atmos doesn't appear to be explicitly supported by Plex in an MKA container, only DTS?

MKV Atmos files play fine.

The folder where the .mka files are was added to Plex as a type 'Music' folder.

The Plex server is running on another different Nvidia Shield TV

My Plex server Dashboard shows the below which looks like it should be working but my Denon AVR doesn't recognize the stream as Atmos and won't go into Atmos mode when it's playing, it says 'Not available'

Kodi on the same box plays the same file fine in Atmos.

 

[pat bateman]

It’s been a year or so since I tried this, and I had the same result as you. The conclusion after posting on Plex forums or contacting them (can’t remember which I did), was multichannel audio will only pass-through if its a “video” library. Sure enough, I dropped some Atmos M4A and MKA files in in my “Movies” folder, and Plex played them back fine. Obviously not a great solution, so as far as I know, Kodi is the only media manager that will pass-through a multichannel audio file.

 

[dabl]

It’s been a year or so since I tried this, and I had the same result as you. The conclusion after posting on Plex forums or contacting them (can’t remember which I did), was multichannel audio will only pass-through if its a “video” library. Sure enough, I dropped some Atmos M4A and MKA files in in my “Movies” folder, and Plex played them back fine. Obviously not a great solution, so as far as I know, Kodi is the only media manager that will pass-through a multichannel audio file.

Thanks, makes sense, was just about to try that!

 

[pat bateman]

Thanks, makes sense, was just about to try that!

If memory serves, I think I had to change the MKA/M4A to MKV/MP4 actually. Simple as changing the extension I think.

 

[dabl]

If memory serves, I think I had to change the MKA/M4A to MKV/MP4 actually. Simple as changing the extension I think.

I appreciate the helpful comments, thanks!

I know it was quite awhile back and maybe himey doesn't still use Plex but I can't figure out per his comments in this thread how he seemed to be able to 'make it all work'.

I may need to ping him. Per his past comments in this thread his setup seemed to hinge on using Kodi as the actual player and Plex as the back end via the use of the Kodi PlexKodiConnect add-on, which makes sense but I'd think first you have to make Plex see and work with the MKA (Atmos) files natively?

It seems like having to put music files in video folders is a pretty big compromise but just wanted to confirm that is/was what he was doing etc. I mean, doesn't having to put/define MKA files as video files negate the whole point of using MKA over MKV?

One might say why not just use Kodi? Well, I'd love to as that is what I am and have been using as my main player for everything for years.

Maybe it doesn't happen with Kodi on other platforms but I've found that with both the Kodi Android v19 Matrix and current v20 Nexus builds running on an Nvidia Shield TV that MKA files crash the system quite regularly. That's (yet another) Kodi bug I need to follow up on and report but in the meanwhile I was hoping to maybe get some relief using Plex on the Shield.

The other complication for me is I really don't particularly want to convert over to using a Plex back end for the database since I have tons of SACD and Blu-Ray .iso files which Plex doesn't support.

I suppose I might be better off simply abandoning MKA for now as I don't have too many and converting those to MKV which doesn't seem to present a problem for Kodi. Of course, then I'm back to using/defining audio files as video files simply to get them to play etc.
Hopefully Music Media Helper can convert a bunch of .mka files to a single .mkv

I have VLC installed and configured as an external player in Kodi and can use the context menu on the first .mka file in a folder and select 'Play using'. The catch is it will only play that single file. But I just tested trying 'Play using' with the native 'VideoPlayer' (versus the default 'PAPlayer') and it actually cues all the files in the folder so if I get better behavior with MKA files using that method it's at least a partial workaround and/or helpful in narrowing down the bug.

I welcome any comments and suggestions for anything I might be missing.

 

[dabl]

Ok so per private reply from himey he had/has no Atmos in MKA requirement which explains why it all appeared to work for him.

 

[himey]

Ok so per private reply from himey he had/has no Atmos in MKA requirement which explains why it all appeared to work for him.

But they do work in Kodi using PlexKodiConnect. The only issue is it won't be gapless.

I have never used Plex as a frontend. I only use Plex as a server.

I believe @ngs428 can confirm Atmos passthrough with PlexKodiConnect.

 

[dabl]

But they do work in Kodi using PlexKodiConnect. The only issue is it won't be gapless.

I have never used Plex as a frontend. I only use Plex as a server.

I believe @ngs428 can confirm Atmos passthrough with PlexKodiConnect.

Thanks. Yes I believe I understand your use case. Atmos support is the missing link there.

I'll try pinging ngs428 but reading back through his comments in the thread, unless I'm missing something, his experiences appear to mirror mine and pat's and he reverted to using mkv. His main focus seemed to be gapless playback which is a whole other can of worms.

 

[HomerJAU]

You can get gapless MKV and MKA playback using a CUE file in Kodi. The only issue is the last track has no Duration. I have it on my list to write some code to fix that. It’s just missing in the last track’s duration entry in the Kodi database.

I’ve been using .m4a files for all my Atmos BD rips. They can be tagged and so appear nicely in Kodi’s music library and GUI. MP4 and M4A files are easily tagged just like any other ‘normal’ music file, whereas MKV and MKA use a non standard tagging system not supported by Kodi or JRiver.

An undocumented feature for Kodi is you can add tagged mp4 video (music concert) files to Kodi’s music library (not the music video library). So the concert appears under the Artist view as an ‘Album’ in Kodi’s GUI and supported by Kodi for playlist queues.

MMH has tools to batch convert MKV/MKA to MP4/M4A.

M4A can also contain DTS-HDMA streams, as well as Atmos/TrueHD. M4A with Atmos is supported from Kodi 19.2 onwards but still not supported in many other popular media players like VLC, JRiver.

 

[dabl]

You can get gapless MKV and MKA playback using a CUE file in Kodi. The only issue is the last track has no Duration. I have it on my list to write some code to fix that. It’s just missing in the last track’s duration entry in the Kodi database.

I’ve been using .m4a files for all my Atmos BD rips. They can be tagged and so appear nicely in Kodi’s music library and GUI. MP4 and M4A files are easily tagged just like any other ‘normal’ music file, whereas MKV and MKA use a non standard tagging system not supported by Kodi or JRiver.

An undocumented feature for Kodi is you can add tagged mp4 video (music concert) files to Kodi’s music library (not the music video library). So the concert appears under the Artist view as an ‘Album’ in Kodi’s GUI and supported by Kodi for playlist queues.

MMH has tools to batch convert MKV/MKA to MP4/M4A.

M4A can also contain DTS-HDMA streams, as well as Atmos/TrueHD. M4A with Atmos is supported from Kodi 19.2 onwards but still not supported in many other popular media players like VLC, JRiver.

Thank you! I know you've said a lot of this before, am still trying to get my head around all the ifs ands or buts of the various options.

Gapless playback for audio files in Kodi other than .flac would indeed be a nice goal. It would be great if that could be supported without the user jumping through hoops. For example a playlist like a .cue isn't required for gapless .flac playback etc.

From my limited perspective (it's all about the 'sink'?) it seems that the Kodi devs sometimes come up with excuses why something gets broken and want to shut the problem report down. Gapless .mka playback is a perfect example, it seems somebody didn't get the memo that it can work (now) with a .cue file and close these open tickets?

Getting on a slightly off topic rant it seems like to date to get a good experience with these media managers often requires a lot of futzing with content and often significant sacrifices are made such as no menus for blu-ray rips. While those are often superfluous, many times huge amounts of content would need to be tediously converted to port over everything to separate .mkv files etc.

I thought Kodi was a huge win for that with blu-ray menu support and more recently support for sacd .iso vs converting hundreds of these to .dsf etc.

As far as Blu-Ray menus in Kodi go it seems support for that on the Windows PC (and perhaps linux) side may be far easier since the java environment has been long established there where it is basically non-existent in Android.

Meanwhile thanks for the clear concise roadmap to solving the topic at hand!

 

[pat bateman]

Maybe it doesn't happen with Kodi on other platforms but I've found that with both the Kodi Android v19 Matrix and current v20 Nexus builds running on an Nvidia Shield TV that MKA files crash the system quite regularly. That's (yet another) Kodi bug I need to follow up on and report but in the meanwhile I was hoping to maybe get some relief using Plex on the Shield.

Are you using WiFi or ethernet to your Shield? I am using WiFi, and I noticed a *lot* better performance and less crashing using NFS instead of SMB. If you have a NAS, then NFS setup is a breeze. If your server is on Windows however, NFS is much more painful to setup.

Another thing that may drive you crazy about playing any high resolution M4A/MKA file in Kodi, is the duration timer is broken. Best I can describe it, is it dances around erratically. I believe Garry already submitted this bug report, but the fix didn't make it to 19.4. I haven't tried the 20.0 beta yet however.

I personally converted all my MKA to M4A. As already mentioned, tagging is fully supported (no need for cue files) and works beautifully. I can't think of any reason to use MKA over M4A, but I could be missing something.

 

[mandrix]

Are you using WiFi or ethernet to your Shield? I am using WiFi, and I noticed a *lot* better performance and less crashing using NFS instead of SMB. If you have a NAS, then NFS setup is a breeze. If your server is on Windows however, NFS is much more painful to setup.

Another thing that may drive you crazy about playing any high resolution M4A/MKA file in Kodi, is the duration timer is broken. Best I can describe it, is it dances around erratically. I believe Garry already submitted this bug report, but the fix didn't make it to 19.4. I haven't tried the 20.0 beta yet however.

I personally converted all my MKA to M4A. As already mentioned, tagging is fully supported (no need for cue files) and works beautifully. I can't think of any reason to use MKA over M4A, but I could be missing something.

I don't have a dog in this hunt BUT, NFS vs SMB;

To stream to my Oppo I use a paid solution for NFS so as to avoid the vagaries of SMB. A free trial of haneWIN NFS Server can be obtained from here:
https://www.hanewin.net/
I know you have a solution with your NAS, but maybe this will help others.

 

[HomerJAU]

I know you have a solution with your NAS, but maybe this will help others.

Synology NAS and I presume others come with a Linux based IS with NFS built in.

I have read many Kodi users using SNB with network issues. Switching to NFS solves those issues.

 

[mandrix]

Synology NAS and I presume others come with a Linux based IS with NFS built in.

I have read many Kodi users using SNB with network issues. Switching to NFS solves those issues.

Yes. It did with my jailbroke Oppo. But I'm just saying this utility makes it easier (for non-NAS owners) to do, if people have issues. Windows has some support for NFS, it has to, but not always a good connection does it make. Support for SMB in Windows has pretty much been deprecated, especially for older devices that require SMB v1.
Just trying to help.

 

[HomerJAU]

I personally converted all my MKA to M4A. As already mentioned, tagging is fully supported (no need for cue files) and works beautifully. I can't think of any reason to use MKA over M4A, but I could be missing something.

Agreed.

Cue files are only needed to get gapless for Atmos. It’s an issue we all see playing Atmos on all systems. The AVR takes a few milliseconds to do the HDMI handshake and initiate the decode on each file start which causes the audio to be trimmed.

By using a cue with the Atmos release as one continuous file the handshake is only done at start, then it plays with no hiccup (it’s really playing only one file so of course it’s gapless). This is just a workaround to solve ‘gapless’ for albums like Abby Road. It’s not required for anything else.

Although I do my concerts as one file with a cue. Best of both worlds, gapless plus I can go to any track instantly,

 

[dabl]

Thanks for all the helpful input. I use a wired connection for everything and do have NFS enabled on my unRaid server and used that awhile back for similar reasons to rule out SMB issues with movie playback so can try that in addition to the other options.

Yeah I've noticed the Kodi duration timer thing and remember now seeing Garry's bug report about it. Didn't think to look at that in the Nexus Beta but will next time. It is definitely annoying.

 

[pat bateman]

@HomerJAU
Sorry if it wasn't this thread, but I believe I saw that you submitted the bug report to Kodi devs about the dancing progress bar/timer when playing back 96 khz? 16.5 unfortunately does not fix it. It doesn't "dance" on my Mac, so I got excited, but no love for Android TV.