[luci5r]

FYI, I read on the MakeMKV forum from two users that JRiver Media Center now supports BD menus for both BD and UHD Blu-ray. It is paid software and offers nothing new, as it is a native madVR player, but I thought you might be interested...

Link: http://makemkv.com/forum2/viewtopic.php?...103#p63270\

Edit: I don't think you can add it as an external player, so it might not be useful to you.

 I think JRiver is an entire front end?  I don't think its player can be launched separate from the front end any more than the KODI player could.  I also prefer KODI as a front end and have no interest replacing it especially for a closed source paid one although SDR and HDR menus offers another alternative.  3D too?  That said, I have not looked at JRiver install files and am completely unfamiliar with it.  Thank you for presenting something new at the table.  This info may come in handy one day......  

Yes, JRiver is complete front-end. I didn't think about it before I posted. I thought it would have been an ideal solution for someone with a collection full of ISO files. nevcairiel, the developer of LAV Filters, works part-time for JRiver. I have tried it and it is not as customizable or as deep as Kodi. No doubt about that. It just has an excellent media player. 

That is correct. My intention was never to replace Kodi or its internal player for that matter - except for BD ISO & 4K HDR. Not being able to launch a player as external player via Kodi is a deal breaker. Thanks for the post & info though. It was a good read - I had no idea jRiver was handing 4K & HDR, including 4K ISO playback with menus. This was very promising and optimistic to read. Not too long ago, MPC/MadVR or PDVD with special hardware were the only 2 means of playing back 4K HDR, then stepped in DVDFab, then stepped in VLC Vetinari, and now jRiver - while incompatible with Kodi, is providing it's users the same capabilities. This is an excellent direction the media player industry, specially the free media player industry is heading towards. I'm delighted!

Understand, PCF is supported..... it just doesn't work correctly anymore, at least in all my testing with KODI v.18 Alpha's.

Wait, what? Playercorefactory.xml is not supported in Kodi v18 "Leia" Alpha 1? But that's the version I'm using and I'm also using playercorefactory.xml with it - and it's launching my external players per the code & definitions defined in this thread; the .bat files et al. What am I missing here? What version of Kodi are you using?

Still waiting on your manual mount of hdr.iso playback confirm or deny.....

So my eternal apologies for the delay - It just so happens that the day I discovered VLC Vetinari, we began a critical phase at work with strict deadlines. I have been ridiculously swamped and my personal time has taken a prolific hit. I'm an Engineer for NASA, working on the upcoming Mars & Europa missions and we're pushing 'cosmic' deadlines (pun intended) to meet mission demands. Media & games have been a strong hobby of mine, almost a passion, for as long as I can remember. Unfortunately I've just been consumed with my other passion - my work. I'll make every effort to test the ISO with VLC as soon as I can squeeze a moment. Thanks for your patience.

Thanks guys.

[Warner306]

 

  

 

I'm an Engineer for NASA, working on the upcoming Mars & Europa missions and we're pushing 'cosmic' deadlines (pun intended) to meet mission demands. 
Thanks guys.  

Given you are posting here, I am assuming that is not a just a line to pick up women? At least, getting out of bed isn't boring.

[brazen1]

Just installed KODI v.18 x64 nightly June 20th and will not promptly revert for a couple hours in case anyone suggests further diagnostics.

I didn't do a lot of testing.  Just what I've been previously doing and see no reason to test any further given the results are always the same.  If it can't oblige this basic function, what's the use of testing anymore..... I could use some help testing to verify if it's just my environment or applicable to everyone else as well.  I've just been adding one collection folder to KODI for testing, 3D MOVIES but it won't matter what you add.

When you open KODI and press enter on a title, it will open the default player assigned for that title as it should and all is well.  I played Avatar with PDVD because PDVD is the default player defined by the PCF.  Next, using the 'Play Using' menu, select another player to open a title.  Any title and any other player other than the previous one (PDVD) just used.  So, I manually select The Martian to open with MPC.  Not gonna' happen.  The Martian opens with PDVD instead of MPC I just manually selected.  Same or different title will only open with the 1st player used.  The PCF is not being obeyed.

Close and reopen KODI.  Manually select Avatar to play with MPC so that PDVD does not default.  All is well.  Default select or manually select Avatar (or any other title) to play with PDVD.  It plays using MPC even though you selected PDVD. 

The PCF only works properly once.  Subsequent PCF playbacks are ignored and so is manual intervention using the 'Play using' option.  This is not only inherent to PDVD and MPC.  I use 5 players and they all behave this way.  This behavior is not present using KODI v.17.6 and it works perfectly.

Here is a debug log fwiw.  Opened Avatar by pressing enter on title.  It defaults to using PDVD as it should.  Manually selected 'play using' to open with MPC-HC.  PDVD opens instead.

https://paste.kodi.tv/cizoqirari

[luci5r]

Just installed KODI v.18 x64 nightly June 20th and will not promptly revert for a couple hours in case anyone suggests further diagnostics.

I didn't do a lot of testing.  Just what I've been previously doing and see no reason to test any further given the results are always the same.  If it can't oblige this basic function, what's the use of testing anymore..... I could use some help testing to verify if it's just my environment or applicable to everyone else as well.  I've just been adding one collection folder to KODI for testing, 3D MOVIES but it won't matter what you add.

When you open KODI and press enter on a title, it will open the default player assigned for that title as it should and all is well.  I played Avatar with PDVD because PDVD is the default player defined by the PCF.  Next, using the 'Play Using' menu, select another player to open a title.  Any title and any other player other than the previous one (PDVD) just used.  So, I manually select The Martian to open with MPC.  Not gonna' happen.  The Martian opens with PDVD instead of MPC I just manually selected.  Same or different title will only open with the 1st player used.  The PCF is not being obeyed.

Close and reopen KODI.  Manually select Avatar to play with MPC so that PDVD does not default.  All is well.  Default select or manually select Avatar (or any other title) to play with PDVD.  It plays using MPC even though you selected PDVD. 

The PCF only works properly once.  Subsequent PCF playbacks are ignored and so is manual intervention using the 'Play using' option.  This is not only inherent to PDVD and MPC.  I use 5 players and they all behave this way.  This behavior is not present using KODI v.17.6 and it works perfectly.

Here is a debug log fwiw.  Opened Avatar by pressing enter on title.  It defaults to using PDVD as it should.  Manually selected 'play using' to open with MPC-HC.  PDVD opens instead.

https://paste.kodi.tv/cizoqirari

Right, I catch your drift now. When you (or the other poster) stated PFC is no longer supported, I thought you meant it has been totally revoked. The issue that you mentioned, I have been experiencing from Day 1 of Kodi v18. Essentially, PFC only invokes the correct external player the first time, but not thereafter, unless you quit & restart Kodi. This has not been a problem for me as I've never really needed to invoke the external player twice, and if I did, I knew a quick restart of Kodi would fix it. It's annoying, and shouldn't exist, but hasn't been an issue.

Although in retrospect, now that multiple external players are being used for different types of Media, this could potentially become a significant annoyance. My usage just hasn't really been of the nature to come across this annoyance frequently.

Thanks for the detail - this clarifies it. It did frighten me when I first saw that post - like I said, I thought the entire support for PFC had been abandoned.

Strangely, I always had some issue or other with v17 (Krypton), from frequent crashes & freezes to connectivity issues; strange issues that most people never really had a problem with. Somehow all of those issues went away with v18, so I have to say I don't see myself reverting to v17. Outside of this multiple external player launches in one session issue, which is negligible for me, v18 seems to be far more stable and solid for my setup & experience at least.

Given you are posting here, I am assuming that is not a just a line to pick up women? At least, getting out of bed isn't boring.

No, Sir, it definitely isn't a pickup line, and it most certainly is far from boring getting out of bed every morning, albeit slightly earlier then I'd prefer, nevertheless!

[luci5r]

 If VLC is limited and can't handle an iso, I have no interest in it personally.  I see you tested and VLC does not mount an iso and play it like DVDFab or PDVD for instance.  I am interested if it can play an iso once the iso is mounted, similar to MPC players though.  Afaik, VLC is not compatible with madVR which is fine.  Neither are other players we incorporate here to launch from KODI.  Perhaps there are enough settings in VLC to produce a decent image which perks my interest especially if it auto switches HDR mode on/off (not Windows HDR) as you have confirmed.  Still waiting on your manual mount of hdr.iso playback confirm or deny..... If you don't have an hdr.iso, an sdr.iso will suffice.  If you all you have is file structure, you can convert it to iso using ImgBurn.  Even a file structure test will suffice.

Double click an hdr.iso in Windows Explorer and navigate to the new drive letter mount.  With the iso mounted OR from file structure, Open BDMV folder.  Right click index.bdmv and select to open with VLC. 

So I did squeeze in the few minutes to test exactly what you were looking for.

I have some astonishingly positive answers for you.

First Test:
Opened a Blu-Ray ISO file in VLC. It immediately mounted the ISO file & began playback. Complete with BD ISO Menus.

Second Test:
Mounted an ISO file manually, and in VLC, chose "Open Folder" and selected the mounted Blu-ray drive. Immediate playback.

Third & Final Test:
The above 2 tests were for original 1080p Blu-Ray ISO. So I decided to test my Atomic Blonde 4K UHD HDR Blu-ray ISO. I was astonished that it actually mounted that ISO & began playback as well. The only difference was, this time it began to playback the main movie stream and gave a message that "This disc requires JAVA for Menus. Java was not found on your system. Disc will be played back without menus." I did quickly hop over to Oracle and downloaded & installed JAVA, however, I'm still getting that message. At this moment I don't have more time to test this further, but perhaps someone else can take it from here. I'll get back to resolving this JAVA issue later.

I'm assuming the above is what you were looking for.

Quite frankly, I would love to see if you can spend some time with VLC Vetinari and give your report. On my secondary HTPC with GT 1030, I'm looking for a DVDFab like 4K UHD HDR solution, which cannot handle something like MadVR, and does not meet the PDVD special hardware requirements, but is capable of playing back UHD HDR. VLC is starting to looking like a good a solution! But I'd like your take on it.

[brazen1]

Hmmm?  I still need to know if a mounted iso using Windows Explorer (not VLC directed mount and not VLC 'open folder') works.  Doing exactly the procedure I wrote earlier.  I need it drilled down to the index.bdmv.  This way I know if VLC will honor a drive letter mount handed to it externally or fumbles and doesn't know what to do.  Sound promising so far especially for GT1030 users if all goes well.

I think JAVA comes in 32bit and x64 flavors and for a x64 system, you must install both.  I don't like having JAVA installed but if it's it do or die, I suppose there's no choice.  If it enables menus, which JAVA very well might, it's worth it I guess.

If you can follow these steps and get it going, I'm going to repeat to confirm and then see if code follows suit with the theory.

Ok then, I'm not alone with the v.18 PCF problem.  I will still be working with v.17.6 until the PCF is addressed, if ever.  I hope so....

Thank you btw....

[Warner306]

The last post I read from Team Kodi on the playercorefactory.xml issue is that it is known and patience is required. It is probably one of the many reasons v18 is still Alpha.

[brazen1]

Yes, I know.  I mentioned this particular PCF problem about a year ago when v.18 nightlies 1st started to appear.  I toss out a reminder here and there hoping one of them gets read.  Haven't seen any replies.  Have not submitted bug report to draw more attention either.  I simply never learned how.  However, I have seen bugs reported in various forum posts that are addressed.  Maybe if others mentioned it, it wouldn't be considered isolated if that is indeed what it is considered and that's if the issue is even known.  If something you read confirms the issue is known, that's good news.  Seems I read something by patk but I don't know if devs are informed?  My plan is to just be patient and when it goes into RC, if it hasn't been addressed, then I'll call out the cavalry so it's caught before the release provided it is deemed worthy of attention.

I've installed VLC v.4 nightly and v.3.  It does mount and play iso's but it fumbles using index.bdmv.  I was prompted about JAVA for menus but the immediate goal was HDR so I didn't install it.  UHD does mount and play but HDR mode does not switch.  I think it relies on Windows HDR and no private API's.  I briefly tried a few sensible setting changes but they didn't help.  Tried 3D MVC Frame Packed iso but was only 2D.  Perhaps it needs plug-in options to bring it to life?  Definitely not plug and play ready.  I see no benefit here besides SDR menus (a free option vs PDVD & FAB) unless someone else managed more than I have.  Google searches turned up a bunch of nothing.  Maybe luci5r has some answers and once the coms with Mark Watney subside, he can educated us.  My interest was perked because of this https://forum.kodi.tv/showthread.php?tid...pid2741627

[gotham_x]

To reproduce contained in Dolby Vision , it is necessary tags Dolby Vision in the file and rules playercorefactory ?

[ajamils]

As per this thread we know the Frame Packed 3D movies are automatically recognized and things work as expected but is it possible to identify movies via file name that aren't frame-packed version? For example Side-by-side 3D movies? Similar to how Kodi recognizes 3D movies, is it possible to do the following

--- MadVR reads file name
- if name has 3d tag (example moviename.3d.sbs.mkv)
---> madVR enables "3d" profile
---> Enable 3D mode in Nvidia Console
---> Projector automatically switches to 3D mode

Currently if I play a 3D blu-ray via Xbone X, my projector automatically switches to 3D mode and goes back to normal when playback finishes. On the other hand, if I play a mkv, automatic switch does not happen though Kodi does combine left/right side images. I have to manually switch the projector to Side-by-Side 3D mode.

[brazen1]

The KODI internal VideoPlayer has nothing to do with madVR, NCP, or tagging.  SBS.mkv's are not dependent on any stereoscopic settings other than enabling in KODI and your PJ.  Global and NCP stereoscopic do not even need to be enabled for sbs.mkv, only Frame Packed.  I have no idea why your PJ auto switches using Xbone X, which I am unfamiliar with, and not with VideoPlayer?  It should using the KODI player or any other player.  PDVD, MPC and VideoPlayer all auto switch for me using all formats so I know it isn't software limitations.  Did you check the header info stereoscopic value using mkvToolNix?  I think it should be 1 or 11.  Maybe Xbone X doesn't rely on it and KODI does.  Did you try another player like MPC with LAV and madVR via Windows Explorer for further diagnostics?

[ajamils]

I have checked the headers and they are set correctly.

I know what the issue is but I don't know what can I do to over come that. As I understand, auto switching happens when they player send the info that content is 3D, which I believe only happens with frame-packed 3D and not ripped SBS mkvs.
When a 3D SBS is played in MPC it just see it as regular 1080p movie (which it technically is) and plays it as normal. On the other hand when same file is played in Native Kodi player it recognizes 3D movie from the 3d.sbs tag and merges both images.
When 3D movie is played in Xbox one, since it a full Blu-ray it has whatever secret ingredient is required for the projector to determine the stream as 3D and it automatically switches the mode.

The KODI internal VideoPlayer has nothing to do with madVR, NCP, or tagging.  SBS.mkv's are not dependent on any stereoscopic settings other than enabling in KODI and your PJ.  Global and NCP stereoscopic do not even need to be enabled for sbs.mkv, only Frame Packed.  I have no idea why your PJ auto switches using Xbone X, which I am unfamiliar with, and not with VideoPlayer?  It should using the KODI player or any other player.  PDVD, MPC and VideoPlayer all auto switch for me using all formats so I know it isn't software limitations.  Did you check the header info stereoscopic value using mkvToolNix?  I think it should be 1 or 11.  Maybe Xbone X doesn't rely on it and KODI does.  Did you try another player like MPC with LAV and madVR via Windows Explorer for further diagnostics?

[Mount81]

I have checked the headers and they are set correctly.

I know what the issue is but I don't know what can I do to over come that. As I understand, auto switching happens when they player send the info that content is 3D, which I believe only happens with frame-packed 3D and not ripped SBS mkvs.
When a 3D SBS is played in MPC it just see it as regular 1080p movie (which it technically is) and plays it as normal. On the other hand when same file is played in Native Kodi player it recognizes 3D movie from the 3d.sbs tag and merges both images.
When 3D movie is played in Xbox one, since it a full Blu-ray it has whatever secret ingredient is required for the projector to determine the stream as 3D and it automatically switches the mode.

I guess that's it and as simple as it is. 3D MVC BD's are just real 3D MVC, which SBS videos just aren't. SBS or OU would only auto trigger 3D mode on the display if the display has this "extra" feature to recognize somehow these "split screen" videos. I guess It -should- have nothing to do with the playback software or even with the hardware, only the matter of the display on it's own. As far as I can conclude, in the case of SBS and OU videos, all the 3D image processing is also the duty of the display only.

[brazen1]

I'd bet a sbs.mkv via USB directly into the display using its internal player would switch 1st time every time.  I think by the time the file is run through various software players, the display doesn't have it raw enough to know what to do even though the header metadata is defined.  There was a point in time when external software had to evoke 3D since the panel failed to do it automatically.  Those days are gone.  Displays evolved and/or software understands how to handoff mkv butcher jobs better I suppose.  This is all just another reason I prefer untouched rips in there native format.

https://forum.kodi.tv/showthread.php?tid...id=1623427

[Mount81]

Thinking more into it, it -may- can be also depend how the playback software decodes and processes those half-res 3D videos, and this varies also with the constellation of how sensitive and enhanced is the displays auto recognition mechanism.  If there's something isn't quite standard with the header info, could be only matter in the case if the displays internal player is used. Am I right on this one, or is the header info also been passed though the HDMI to the display? But it also could be possible, if some of the displays internal players, or -in the case of the external players devices- their auto recognition mechanisms could also detect it, without any referring header information, and would trigger just by the "simple fact" of the "Cut-Screen situation" somehow.