No audio in Windows Media Player since upgrading to 0.9.5

[altano]

Hello,

I've ripped tons of movies with 0.9.4, but since upgrading to 0.9.5, Windows Media Player will no longer play the audio of my rips. VLC *will* play the audio.

I am ripping with the default "High Profile" setting (just like I used to) on a Windows Home Server (basically Windows Server 2003). I am ripping to .m4v files but renaming them to .mp4 did not fix the audio.

One DVD I ripped had:
Source - 1 Unknown (AC3) (2.0 ch)
And two audio tracks:
1) AAC (faac)
2) AC3 Passthrough

Log file (for one title) is here: http://paste.handbrake.fr/pastebin.php?show=2011

The other had:
Source - 1 Unknown (LPCM) (2.0 ch)
And two audio tracks:
1) AAC (faac)
2) AC3 Passthrough

Does "High Profile" no longer support Windows Media Player, or is this not by design?

Thanks in advance for any help you are all able to offer.

[s55]

I wouldn't expect any of HandBrakes presets, from any version, to ever work with WMP on anything less than a windows 7 based box on an "out the box" install. You'll need codec packs installed.

Do you have an AC3 or AAC decoder installed on the box?
Have you tried switching the audio to the second track in WMP? I know out the box it doesn't support AC3 and it may be selecting that as the default. Not sure if they supported AAC back then.

The encode itself looks fine, and the fact VLC plays it back confirms that.

[altano]

Thanks s55 for getting back to me.

I wouldn't expect any of HandBrakes presets, from any version, to ever work with WMP on anything less than a windows 7 based box on an "out the box" install. You'll need codec packs installed.

While encoding on a Windows Home Server, I'm actually only attempting playback from Windows 7 machines. Also, on this machine I am able to play back anything encoded with Handbrake 0.9.4 with the default "High Profile" setting. I haven't changed anything other than upgrading to Handbrake 0.9.5.

Do you have an AC3 or AAC decoder installed on the box?

I haven't installed one, so whatever comes default with Windows 7.

Have you tried switching the audio to the second track in WMP? I know out the box it doesn't support AC3 and it may be selecting that as the default. Not sure if they supported AAC back then.

It was set to Track 1, which if that correlates to the Handbrake UI, is the AAC track. I tried switching it to Track 2 and that didn't help.

The encode itself looks fine, and the fact VLC plays it back confirms that.

True! The question then becomes, do the Handbrake developers expect Handbrake to work with WMP on Windows 7 or not? If the answer is yes, then the fact that it plays in VLC is informative but doesn't mean the encode worked as expected

Thanks in advance for all your help!

[thompson]

True! The question then becomes, do the Handbrake developers expect Handbrake to work with WMP on Windows 7 or not? If the answer is yes, then the fact that it plays in VLC is informative but doesn't mean the encode worked as expected

I think the developers expect handbrake to work with players that are not degenerate. WMP is a seriously degenerate player. The problem is that one could go mad trying to work out the quirks of all the ways certain players are broken, better to code to the standard and leave it to the developers of the players to sort it out.

[Timber]

He is by no means the only person with this problem. I've been experiencing exactly the same thing.

version 0.9.4 worked fine and all the files I converted with it played fine. After I "upgraded" to version 0.9.5, the video converted but the audio did not on any of the 20 or 30 files I tried to convert.

I uninstalled handbrake and reinstalled the old version 0.9.4 and was able to convert and play those exact same files.

It's not a question of a single user's installation as you've been implying. The audio conversion just doesnt work in the new release. I'm hoping to see a new nightly build at some point that corrects this, because the new version does look much nicer, but not yet usable till the lost audio issue gets resolved.

There's also at least one other stability issue. For some files they've been generating out of memory errors on the last step of conversion resulting in a non-playable file, which is something I never saw in v0.9.4. In fact when I reverted back to 0.9.4 these same files converted fine.

[s55]

@altano - Just done some testing, WMP plays back AAC tracks fine for me. AC3 doesn't work, but that's to be expected. I would expect K-Lite or something would help there, but I havn't myself had much success with any AC3 audio, regardless if it came from HB or not. Have you tried creating a test sample with only AAC audio?

He is by no means the only person with this problem. I've been experiencing exactly the same thing.

Never said he was.

version 0.9.4 worked fine and all the files I converted with it played fine. After I "upgraded" to version 0.9.5, the video converted but the audio did not on any of the 20 or 30 files I tried to convert.

Doesn't mean it's a HandBrake issue. For example, we've already seen several playback devices and players that don't work properly with 0.9.5's output because they have buggy VFR support which is now correctly flagged in 0.9.5 (0.9.4 wasn't flagging files correctly).

It's not a question of a single user's installation as you've been implying.

Again, I did not imply this.

The audio conversion just doesnt work in the new release I'm hoping to see a new nightly build at some point that corrects this, because the new version does look much nicer, but not yet usable till the lost audio issue gets resolved.

Well, given you've not given us a shred of evidence there is any problem with the encoded file, not likely. Got a sample? Got an encode log? Does it work in other players? what Codec packs do you have installed? Have you ruled out bugs in them? Have you ruled out bugs in WMP?

[s55]

There's also at least one other stability issue. For some files they've been generating out of memory errors on the last step of conversion resulting in a non-playable file, which is something I never saw in v0.9.4. In fact when I reverted back to 0.9.4 these same files converted fine.

I suppose you want that fixed in a nightly as well? We'll just crack out the crystal balls and figure out all the information you've failed to provide ourselves.

[s55]

@altano - a short sample of the output (no more than 30 seconds) would be good to look at if you can do that?

[altano]

Have you tried creating a test sample with only AAC audio?

I re-encoded after removing the AC3 audio track and that DOES work, by default, in WMP. This left me curious as to why manually changing the audio track in WMP did not fix the problem. Apparently, when I change the audio track in the menu, and then look at the menu again, it is still on Audio Track 1. So it either doesn't know what audio track it is on, can't switch to Audio Track 2, or the whole audio track switching mechanism is broken when playing back this file. Or something even stranger :p

Can you reproduce by just using the default High Profile setting and not removing the AC3 track?

@altano - a short sample of the output (no more than 30 seconds) would be good to look at if you can do that?

Absolutely. Here are two 10-second examples, both < 2MB:
Handbrake 0.9.5 Sample - AAC & AC3 - DOES NOT WORK
Handbrake 0.9.5 Sample - AAC Only - WORKS

Also, I apologize for Timber's comments and tone. I don't share any such sense of self entitlement and am appreciative of any help you are willing to provide, and would fully understand if that was none at all.

Thanks again.

[s55]

Both tracks in the AAC/AC3 are there and working but not in WMP. Not quite sure why.

Funnily enough though, if I take your file and re-encode it, to either re-encode AC3 to AC3, I get a corrupted (static/noise) audio track in the output. Suggests there may be either something wrong with the source audio track, or the audio tracks in your file.

Either way, I'll need to experiment more. Hopefully, what I'm seeing is related and not some side issue.

[s55]

Looks like the ac3 encoder is a bit broken in the trunk. (works in 0.9.5) so that was a side issue.

I'll keep playing when I get some time.

[altano]

Have any luck, s55?

[s55]

The AC3 encoder issue that was causing testing problems was fixed recently.

Results of testing:
- Every file I've encoded with AAC/AC3 have worked correctly in a plain WMP install. What I did notice though, is it doesn't show both audio tracks. It looks like it's only the AAC track. This is what I was kinda expecting to see (as I didn't think AC3 was supported in files)
- I can't get either the AAC or AC3 tracks with your broken file to play without turning on different decoders in k-lite codec pack. Infact, several times now, I've caused WMP to outright crash which seems to suggest there is some kind of bug in WMP given it's a valid MP4 file.

The only difference I could see in the mp4 is that yours has a text sub track that in theory, that shouldn't be a problem. Otherwise I can't see anything wrong with the file itself.

It really does look like some really obscure bug in WMP.

Don't really have any further ideas other than suggesting that you try enable the liba52/libavcodec decoders in k-lite for AC3 and E-AC3 (they seem to make wmp work correctly). It doesn't look like there is anything that can be hacked or fixed in HB.

[s55]

incidentally, the same file encoded with 0.9.4 doesn't work with WMP either.

[djjroy]

I got a similar problem, but more serious. I have been using handbrake for some time. When I upgraded from 9.4 to 9.5 (MBP 64bit and Imac 32bit) when I would use WMP 64 bit (win 7) and it simply crashes. Any sound option I use ( I mostly use DTS or AC3 pass thru) it would amount to the same thing.

My Windows setup is win 7, shark007 Vista Codec Package x64 Components v274, windows media player 64. I don't use the 32 bit version. I could use the wmp 32bit ver, but I have no problems with the previous version of handbrake, which I have revered to cause it works fine.

[altano]

Thanks for continuing to investigate, s55. I'm afraid I have wasted your time as this turned out to be a bizarre coincidence.

The first two DVDs I tried to encode immediately upon upgrading to 0.9.5 both had this audio issue, which I assumed was due to the upgrade. I've since tried many other DVDs and have been successful with every rip since. I downgraded HandBrake to 0.9.4 and tried encoding the problematic DVDs but still has the same audio issue. So the problem does NOT lie in something related to 0.9.5, but rather either in these DVDs or some bug in WMP.

Let me know if you'd like to continue investigating these issues and I'll provide whatever information you like, but I'm of course satisfied with just having to watch these two DVD rips in VLC.

Thanks again for all your help. Take care!

[s55]

Fwiw, you can install the K-lite codec pack and enable the ac3 decoders. That seems to work with your file so I'm guessing it's some obscure bug in WMP.

[guachi]

No use creating a new thread when this is the same problem I have. Having an ac3 passthrough audio track causes no audio at all. I have a few questions:

s55 mentioned that the "AC3 encoder issue that was causing testing problems was fixed recently." This would be in the nightly build?

How, exactly, does one go about choosing a different audio track, anyway? I've been using Windows Media Player to play my mp4 files, and those with ac3 passthrough don't play 5.1 audio. I couldn't figure out how to choose a different audio track on either that or in Windows Media Center. WMC won't even open any file with ac3 passthrough that I've tested.

Last question, what's the benefit of keeping the ac3 audio as a passthrough? For stereo receivers? What potential negatives are there of not having the ac3 passthrough?

Since I've only been watching on my computer, I've just removed the 2nd audio track, saved a bit of file space, and gone on my merry way.

---- Just installed the K-Lite. mp4 files with ac3 passthrough now play in Media Player. Yay! Media Center now crashes instead of merely not playing the file. Boo! Don't really like using Media Center, anyway. But the huge fonts come in handy sometimes.