PlayStation 3 on Wimpy's World

Mediatomb vs. MiniDLNA

martin@wimpress.com (Martin Wimpress) — Fri, 18 Dec 2009 15:34:12 +0000

I’ve been using Mediatomb for nearly two years now but decided to give MiniDLNA a whirl since it is a fully fledged DLNA server whereas Mediatomb is UPnP only. I’m currently running both Mediatomb SVN and MiniDLNA CVS. So, how does MiniDLNA compare to Mediatomb?

MiniDLNA is easier to compile, configure, uses less RAM and has less software dependencies than Mediatomb.
MiniDLNA doesn’t currently support music play lists or Last.fm scrobbling. Mediatomb supports .m3u and .pls playlists but requires a 3rd party patch to add Last.fm scrobbling.
MiniDLNA doesn’t support dynamic video thumbnail creation, which would be nice to have but is not essential, cover images are supported. Mediatomb supports video thumbnails via ffmpegthumbnailer.
MiniDLNA doesn’t currently have any transcoding support. This is of little consequence for me since I import video content into my library in a format natively supported by the PS3, either MP3, MPEG-2 TS or MPEG-4. Mediatomb does support transcoding but it is somewhat fiddly to setup and you can’t pause transcoded content.
MiniDLNA works “out of the box” with the PS3 (and other DLNA clients) while Mediatomb requires some tweaking.
Mediatomb’s default video import script doesn’t suit how I organise my video library, but MiniDLNA suits my video library perfectly.

So, as of today I am running both Mediatomb and MiniDLNA. Mediatomb is exclusively handling audio since playlist and Last.fm support are essential for me. MiniDLNA is now handling video exclusively. I’m very happy with the results but should MiniDLNA add .m3u/.pls play lists and Last.fm support I will switch everything to MiniDLNA.

2 years later…

Since writing this post MiniDLNA added support for playlists. It still doesn’t support Last.fm scrobbling though. Despite that I switched to MiniDLNA and it has been streaming audio and video around the house for that last couple of years.

DVD to MPEG2-TS Ripper for Linux

martin@wimpress.com (Martin Wimpress) — Fri, 04 Dec 2009 07:53:58 +0000

A while back I released a script that rips a DVD to MPEG-2 PS allowing the user to select one audio stream and one subtitle stream. Optionally the video can be requantised, using M2VRequantiser and an ISO image created. If creating an ISO image the chapters are also preserved from the original DVD. You can see the original post below.

DVD to MPEG-2 PS Ripper for Linux

I’ve just released an update to that original script which fixes subtitles in the original MPEG-2 PS mode but now adds the capability to rip MPEG-2 TS. The video stream can still be shrunk and in MPEG-2 PS mode the video is still requantised but in MPEG-2 TS mode the video is re-encoded as H.264.

Requantising is faster but can introduce artifacting. H.264 encoding is slower, but produces very good quality. I am currently re-importing my entire DVD collection, using this script, to my DLNA server using MPEG-2 TS and re-encoding the video to H.264. This gives me high quality rips at relatively small size (~3Gb) whilst preserving Dolby Digital 5.1 audio. Perfect for playback via DLNA on the PS3. Some things to be aware of:

Subtitles are only supported in MPEG-2 PS mode.
MPEG-2 PS files created by this script are DVD compliant.
ISO files created by this script will preserve the chapters from the original DVD.
The PS3 can only play DTS audio in MPEG-2 PS streams when they have been authored to DVD.
The PS3 can only play subtitles in MPEG-2 PS streams when they have been authored to DVD.
The PS3 can’t play DTS audio in MPEG-2 TS streams therefore this script will transcode DTS to AC3 when in MPEG-2 TS mode.

To download the script and find out how to make full use of it visit the release page below.

DVD-to-MPG

PS3, Mediatomb, Multi Zone Music streaming

martin@wimpress.com (Martin Wimpress) — Sat, 26 Sep 2009 11:02:52 +0000

PlayStation 3 firmware 3.00 added a new feature I was very excited about, multi-av output. Today I finally got round to re-wiring the home cinema system to make use of this new feature. I now have the PS3 streaming music from MediaTomb with my A/V receiver sending audio to Zone 1 via digital inter connects and also sending audio to Zone 2 via analog stereo interconnects.

Zone 1 is a 5.1 speaker setup and Zone 2 is a 2.0 all weather wireless speaker system which are often in the kitchen but also moved outside for parties. If Sony could just add Skype to the PS3 and allow the PSP Remote Play to output audio to both the PS3 and PSP (rather than just one of them) I would be very happy indeed.

MKV to MPEG-4 conversion script

martin@wimpress.com (Martin Wimpress) — Thu, 27 Aug 2009 20:48:58 +0000

The PlayStation 3 can’t play MKV files. Therefore I’ve written a script that creates a PlayStation 3 or Xbox 360 compatible MPEG-4 from Matroska providing the video is H.264 and audio is AC3 or DTS.

Xbox 360 compatibility requires that audio is forcibly downmixed to stereo with --stereo. AAC 5.1 audio will have the correct channel assignments when transcoding from AC3 5.1 and DTS 5.1. If neroAacEnc is installed then it is used in preference to faac for encoding the AAC audio, as it produces better quality output. neroAacEnc is optional.

The script does as little re-encoding as possible, only the audio and subtitles are re-encoded or converted. The script can detect profile 5.1 H.264 and patch it to 4.1 in under a second. Any subtitles in the Matroska are preserved. If mp4creator is used the subtitles are extracted stored in a seperate file. If MP4Box is used (default) the subtitles are converted to GPAC Timed Text and muxed into the resulting MPEG-4. The PlayStation 3 can’t display these subtitles but some software players can.

The script can optionally split the Matroska if it is greater than 4GB to ensure PlayStation 3, Xbox 360 and FAT32 compatibility. This script works on Ubuntu and should work on any other Linux/Unix flavour and possibly Mac OS X providing you have the required tools installed.

MKV-to-MP4

PlayStation 3 compatible MPEG-4 container repacker

martin@wimpress.com (Martin Wimpress) — Thu, 23 Apr 2009 17:09:11 +0000

Some of my mobile phones have been able to record video clips in MPEG-4 format. Sadly some of these clips don’t play on the PlayStation 3 and those that do stutter terribly. I use iplayer-dl to download content from BBC iPlayer. Sadly the files are in a Quicktime container and are not playable on the PlayStation 3.

In order to address both these issues I created a script which extracts the audio and video from an existing MPEG-4 or ISO Media Apple QuickTime container and repacks them in a new MPEG-4 container with optional splitting of the resulting MPEG-4 to maintain FAT32 compatibility. The new MPEG-4 files play just fine on my PlayStation 3. This script works on Ubuntu, should work on any other Linux/Unix flavour and possibly Mac OS X providing you have the required tools installed.

MP4-Repacker

MKV to M2TS conversion script

martin@wimpress.com (Martin Wimpress) — Thu, 23 Apr 2009 17:00:58 +0000

The PlayStation 3 can’t play MKV files. Therefore I’ve written a script that creates a PlayStation 3 compatible M2TS from a MKV, assuming video is H.264 and audio is AC3 or DTS with as little re-encoding as possible. Any subtitles in the MKV are preserved in the M2TS although the PlayStation 3 can’t display subtitles in M2TS containers. Optionally splits the M2TS, if it is greater than 4GB, to maintain FAT32 compatibility. Unlike other MKV to M2TS solutions, this script doesn’t create any intermediate files during the conversion.

The PlayStation 3 can’t play DTS audio streams in M2TS containers, therefore DTS audio is transcoded to AC3.

This script works on Ubuntu, should work on any other Linux/Unix flavour and possibly Mac OS X providing you have the required tools installed.

MKV-to-M2TS

DVD to MPEG2-PS Ripper for Linux

martin@wimpress.com (Martin Wimpress) — Thu, 23 Apr 2009 16:50:31 +0000

Every so often I find myself in looking through the ex-rental DVD “bargain bin”. Quite often I find something I consider a bargain. However, the experience of watching an ex-rental DVD is typically ruined by the various trailers and marketing guff at the start which you can’t skip. My wife hates that stuff, and I love my wife, so I routinely rip the main feature of newly acquired ex-rental DVD movies so we can avoid that crap.

I run a Mediatomb DLNA server and I want to load it with all my DVDs. Ripping them helps reduce the amount of storage I require. MPEG2-PS files are compatible with my PlayStation 3 which is the client to my Mediatomb DLNA server. As a solution to the above I created a script, which can extract the main feature from a DVD video, allowing the user to select one audio stream and one subtitle stream. Optionally the video can be requantised, using M2VRequantiser, and an ISO image created. If creating an ISO image the chapters are also preserved from the original DVD. I’ve lobbed my code into GitHub.

DVD-to-MPG

IMDB Film Summary as a MPEG-2 video

martin@wimpress.com (Martin Wimpress) — Wed, 22 Apr 2009 18:00:07 +0000

UPDATE! I no longer use or maintain the script below. I suggest the vastly superior Sheet Maker for Linux.

If you’ve read my blog before you’ll know I run Mediatomb DLNA server with my PlayStation 3 as the client, You’ll also know I am working towards importing my entire DVD collection into my Mediatomb server. However, my wife wants to know something about each film in the library without having to dig out the DVD case from storage. My solution is to include a MPEG-2 video displaying the film summary in the Mediatomb library for each DVD I have imported so it can be easily viewed from the PS3.

My script is called IMDB-to-MPEG and I’ve finally got round to uploading it.

IMDB-to-MPEG

The scripts takes one parameter as input, a film title. The plotline, year of release, genres, cast list and running time for that film are gathered from IMDB and formatted as text. Here is an example.

 The Usual Suspects (1995)

 A boat has been destroyed, criminals are dead, and
 the key to this mystery lies with the only
 survivor and his twisted, convoluted story
 beginning with five career crooks in a seemingly
 random police lineup. (106 mins)

 Starring Stephen Baldwin as Michael McManus,
 Gabriel Byrne as Dean Keaton, Benicio Del Toro as
 Fred Fenster, Kevin Pollak as Todd Hockney, and
 Kevin Spacey as Roger 'Verbal' Kint.

 Genres: Crime, Mystery, Thriller.

 Rated 8.7 out of 10 from 227,964 votes.

The text is converted into an image and then encoded into a MPEG-2 video using the lowest possible bitrate/resolution that is acceptable to read when viewing on a 42" plasma from my sofa.

Directories for each matching genre are created and also one for the IMDB rating (rounded down). The MPEG-2 is stored in the ‘All’ folder and then symlinked to the genres and rating for that film. I then copy my video into the appropriate directory in ‘All’. For example.

 .
 |-- All
 |   `-- The_Usual_Suspects
 |       `-- About_The_Usual_Suspects.mpg
 |-- Genres
 |   |-- Crime
 |   |   `-- The_Usual_Suspects -> ../../All/The_Usual_Suspects
 |   |-- Mystery
 |   |   `-- The_Usual_Suspects -> ../../All/The_Usual_Suspects
 |   `-- Thriller
 |       `-- The_Usual_Suspects -> ../../All/The_Usual_Suspects
 |-- Ratings
 `-- 8
 `-- The_Usual_Suspects -> ../../All/The_Usual_Suspects

This code was lashed up in a few hours, it ain’t pretty but it works for me on my Ubuntu systems, maybe it’ll work for you too.

Converting Matroska to M2TS for PS3 and Mediatomb

martin@wimpress.com (Martin Wimpress) — Wed, 15 Apr 2009 16:19:24 +0000

It has been a while since I last posted, mainly due to not having Internet access at home for a month. Anyway, I’m online again and I have been tinkering with various projects the most recent of which is Matroska conversion (again).

Matroska to MP4

For sometime I have been converting Martoska files to MPEG-4 with AAC 5.1 audio so I can stream them via Mediatomb to my PlayStation 3. The conversion process works well although there is some overhead in transcoding the audio and the AAC 5.1 audio is not as good quality as the original AC3 or DTS.

If you are interested I’ve put my code in GitHub, the script automates the whole process.

MPV-to-MP4

Matroska to M2TS

A little while back I read it was possible to convert those same Matroska file to M2TS files which, so long as the audio is AC3, so takes much less time to convert. As the PlayStation 3 can’t play DTS audio streams inside a M2TS container there is still a requirement to transcode DTS to AC3. That said the conversion to M2TS requires less file I/O than converting to MPEG-4 and is therefore it is generally a quicker conversion method, typically just 2 or 3 minutes on my workstation at home.

Plus the audio quality of the AC3 or transcoded DTS is better than that of transcoded AAC 5.1. I’ve created my own script to fully automate the conversion process. The script has been tested on Ubuntu 8.10 64-bit but there is an outside chance it will work on Mac OS X if you can get the required tools installed. Again, you can find my script on GitHub.

MPV-to-M2TS

Converting DVB-T to DVD Compliant MPEG-2

martin@wimpress.com (Martin Wimpress) — Thu, 22 Jan 2009 23:46:26 +0000

I am just about to clean up and convert another batch of programmes I have recorded from Freeview (DVB-T in the UK) so that I can add them to my DLNA Server. I thought I’d share the method I use on Ubuntu.

By clean up, I mean edit out any adverts and trim crap from the start and the end of the recordings. It just so happens that the result of this process is a DVD compliant MPEG-2 which is suitable for DVD authoring, or in my case, streaming around the house. This method of conversion should work for any DVB PVR which allows you to export recordings via USB and, of course, MythTV or similar.

DVB Ripping

I have a PlayTV add-on for the PlayStation 3 which enables me to record Freeview (DVB-T) broadcasts to the PS3 internal hard disk. I mostly use PlayTV to record films. To prevent the PlayStation 3 hard disk filling up with films I wanted to export, edit out any adverts and then serve the edited file from my DLNA server or author it to DVD.

This process does not re-encode the audio or video therefore it is fairly quick and the output is the same quality as the input.

Although I am using a PlayStation 3 as PVR and MPEG-2 TS (Transport Stream) file can be converted to a MPEG-2 PS (Program Stream) file using this process.

Export from PlayStation 3

First we need to move the recording from the PlayTV Library to the PS3 Home Menu. Start PlayTV, open the Library, select the recording and choose the Move to Home Menu option.

Quit PlayTV
Plug in an external (FAT32 formatted) USB drive to the PS3.
Go to Video on the PS3 Home Menu and select the recording you moved there earlier.
Select Copy from the Options screen and choose the external USB drive as the target.

Clean MPEG-2 TS and convert to MPEG-2 PS

Plug the USB drive into your Ubuntu workstation and copy the .m2ts file to your hard disk.

You will need to Project X to clean the MPEG-2 TS and convert it to MPEG-2 PS.

apt-get install project-x

Edit out the adverts

Start the Project X GUI and load your .m2ts file.

File -> Add and select your .m2ts file.

Now use Project X to add cut points to edit out any adverts.

De-multiplex the audio and video

When you have completed your edits you need to ‘demux’ the .m2ts file into two streams, one holding the audio (.mp2) and one holding the video (.m2v).

Click the Prepare >> button.
From the Process Window select the Action type to M2P
Click the start button and wait for the processing to finish.
Clock the ‘‘Process Windows’’ and quit Project X.

Re-multiplex the audio and video

The reason for the de-mux and then re-musing it to ensure the timecodes are correct, other the video will not playback correctly.

Install MJPEG tools.

apt-get install mjpegtools

Now we need to re-multiplex the audio and video to create a DVD compliant MPEG-2 PS file.

mplex -f 8 -o muxed-%d.mpg audio.mp2 video.m2v

The -f 8 option specifies a dvd-compliant stream that is compatible with dvdauthor. The -o option specifies the outfile, you can substitute muxed-%d.mpg with a more descriptive name if you like. %d is expanded to a number if mplex decides to split the output to several files, this usually happens when the recording contains commercials and is nothing to worry about.

Author DVD

The MPEG-2 PS file that has been created should be suitable for DVD authoring using DeVeDe. When adding MPEG-2 PS files created using the method above open the DeVeDe Advanced options and select This file is already a DVD/xCD-suitable MPEG-PS file in the Misc menu.