Jump to content

Playing AC3 via WDTVLive


ChrisL

Recommended Posts

Just started using Emby - very impressed so far but I can't seem to play AC3 audio directly via my WD TV Live box.

 

These files play just fine via the Windows shares source in WD TV Live in glorious 6 channel sound, but when I access them via the Emby server they go into transcoding mode. This results in the track restarting itself after about three seconds and then only playing in stereo.

 

I'm guessing I need to find a way of including AC3 as a direct play container (?) codec (?) in the WDTV DLNA profile (or rather create a custom one to include the change)

 

Would this be right, and if so, what would the changes need to be ?

 

I've attached one of the transcode logs if its any help.

 

Thanks in advance

ffmpeg-transcode-b9851220-7fb1-4b77-95e1-ee7ef34ae3f9.txt

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Happy2Play

I guess that is one of those grey areas looking at info provided by WDTV there table for Music doesn't list ac3 a supported extention.  But is supported in video container.

 

I guess you could test by creating a custom WDTV Live profile.

 

Dashboard-DLNA-Profiles-Select WDTV Live Profile-Modify the name somehow (add custom)-Hit Save-click Direct Play-Click New-Type Audio-Container ac3-codec ac3-Hit Save

 

Now navigate back to DLNA the Profiles and you should see your new custom profile.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I hadn't realised that edit dlna profile facility existed (couldn't find it in the wiki) - its very impressive. So I set up a custom profile with the additional items you suggested and also added an item to identify the profile by 'friendly name' having given my WDTVlive a friendly name. When I restarted the server I couldn't tell if the new custom profile had been picked up from looking at the server log but I think it had because when I played my first AC3 file, transcoding was not invoked. Unfortunately, although the WD TV box appeared to be playing the file (usual display and moving time stamp), no sound came out.

 

Any ideas as to what might be wrong?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Happy2Play

Do you see your custom profile name referenced in the log?  Or just WDTV Live?

Edited by Happy2Play
Link to comment
Share on other sites

In the server log I only see the WDTV live (not my custom name) but when I switch on debug for logging I see both the system name and my custom name being used at different times !!

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Happy2Play

It doesn't appear your custom profile is being used for playback. Can you try again after removing the friendly name you added.
 

2017-02-06 09:12:15.4171 Debug Dlna: Logging session activity from location http://192.168.1.72:10184/
2017-02-06 09:12:15.4171 Debug Dlna: Found matching device profile: WDTV Live
2017-02-06 09:12:15.4171 Info Dlna: DLNA Session created for WDTVLive - currently in use - WD TV Live
Edited by Happy2Play
Link to comment
Share on other sites

I removed the 'friendly name' check from the user dlna profile and tried again. I tried to play the same mp3 and ac3 tracks. There was no transcoding but this time neither the mp3 nor the ac3 file would play. WDlive produced error message to the effect that the files were in an unsupported format. Log attached plus the new user profile. I must have got the profile wrong somehow ?

 

Thanks for your help - its appreciated

server-63622045385.txt

MyWDTVLive.xml

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Happy2Play

Don't see any playback in that server log.  All the errors that are in that log are from failed port mapping.  I would disable it via Dashboard-Advanced-Hosting-Automatic port mapping.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Sorry - my fault. I've disabled Automatic Port Mapping as you suggested.

 

I've sorted one issue - one of the ac3 tracks I was trying to play had a '.' in the filename - I had included '5.1' in the name to indicate it was surround sound. This didn't seem to matter when playing via windows shares but I guess Emby is a bit more picky. I renamed the file, rescanned and now I don't get the unsupported format message. So, the current position is that with the user profile I play mp3 ok but ac3 'plays' without sound. I've noticed something else that might be relevant though. When I play an album with several ac3 tracks in it the first track plays (without sound) for fifteen seconds then goes on to play the next track (without sound) for fifteen seconds ......and so on. Is it thinking its a photo slideshow ??

 

log attached (right one I hope)

 

server-63622061416.txt

Link to comment
Share on other sites

What you can do is just wait for the next release and the included wdtv profile will have support for this. Thanks !

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Thanks, I'll wait for the next release and try again. If you need me to test it pre release first just let me know.

 

Thanks again for your efforts.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Thanks for including the updated wdtv live dlna profile. I deleted my old custom profile and restarted the server with 3.2.1 new release. Unfortunately, the symptoms were as before (as 7th Feb) - no sound on ac3 playback and each track stops after 15 secs and loads the next track. Attached log again - attempts at about 09:12 in the log. Could it be something about the different metadata in ac3 files ?

server-63622313100.txt

Link to comment
Share on other sites

The only thing I can think of is the content type in our http response header. I had forgotten about that. I will set it to audio/ac3 for .ac3 files.

 

That's all I can think of. I do not have a WDTV to troubleshoot this myself, but at this point we're direct playing so it's in the hands of the device. If the response header doesn't help then we may just have to go back to letting it convert on the server.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Thanks Luke. If that doesn't work I'll have to try wireshark to see the difference between emby response and playing by Windows shares.

 

Will your response header change be in the next release ?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 2 weeks later...

I just noticed the new release had installed (3.2.3.0) so I tried again assuming you'd made changes to the response header. It was different - but still not a success. This time I selected the first track in an album of AC3 files and the WDTV Live displayed that it was playing it, then immediately skipped to the next track and so on until the end of the album at which point it displayed the message that it was an unsupported format. Log attached. Incidents at about 09:21:49.

 

Thanks Luke

server-63623611096.txt

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Well it is direct playing so there's not much more from the server side to adjust. i'm going to have to just remove that from the profile so that they'll at least work again.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Thanks Luke, but I still need 6 channel audio (ffmeg seems to reduce it to stereo)

 

I tried another tack - the WDTV live streaming media player also supports AC3 within a MKA container so I converted one of my ac3 tracks to be embedded within a MKA container and put it in a folder of its own. Again, this was detected and played in all channels via Windows Shares. I set up a user profile copy of the WD Live profile to include the direct play of MKA containers/ac3 codec.  When I tried to access it on the WDTV live box via Emby folders, the box responded with 'No media found' when I had navigated to the new folder.

 

Any ideas why this might be ?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Create an account or sign in to comment

You need to be a member in order to leave a comment

Create an account

Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!

Register a new account

Sign in

Already have an account? Sign in here.

Sign In Now
×
×
  • Create New...