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[xeddog]

Hi everyone.

I have been trying to use ffmpeg on a linux machine to transcode some high def mkv videos into something that my DSM-520 can play.  I use the mkv tools to extract the separate video and audio files, and I am trying to use ffmpeg to recombine them into an avi file.  I have tried many different combinations of parameters, but I can't get passed the last hurdle.  Here is what happens.

When I transcode the mkv files, I encode them with either the mpeg4 or xvid video codecs.  For the audio, I use either libmp3lame or vorbis encoders (I have tried a couple of others too, but mostly these two).  I will get an output avi file that does one of these things.

1.  The video will start playing just fine but there will be no audio at all.  Then about 10 or 12 seconds into the video it will stop playing smoothly.  It will display a frame every 1 or two seconds and at that time the audio becomes just a "chirp" sound when the video jumps/

2.  The video will play fine all the way through, but absolutely no audio.

3.  Unsupported format error message. 

I have tried just about every combination of parameters I can think of to get the audio to play but no luck.   Does anyone have the magic dust to sprinkle on this for me?

TIA,

xeddog 

[fccgrant]

1.  What is the bit rate of the avi you are creating?  The DSM-520 has a 15 Mbps or so limit.

2.  What media server program are you using to send the AVI to the DSM?

Check this forum...there was a discussion about this awhile back.
http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=593973

Might want to google it out as there is lots of content in the topic.

[xeddog]

Thanks for the reply fccgrant.

Regarding bit rates, The video I have used has varied from about 1500k to about 8000k, but mostly around 4000K.  The audio bit rates have been either 128k or 160K with either 44100 or 48000 sampling.   I have also tried setting audio channels to 2 and 6 to no avail.

For the server programs I have used several . . .  On my XP machine I have mostly used the latest D-Link server (1.10 I think?  Anyway, the latest from the D-Link website).  On my linux machine I mostly use Mediatomb.  It has been simple and effective.  And I have also tried copying the files to a USB drive and attaching that to the 520's USB port.   In many cases I have tried all three methods with the same transcoded output file just to see if there were any differences.  There were not.  The DSM-520 is connected to my network switch via 100Mbps ethernet.  I tried wireless when I first got the 520 but couldn't get satisfactory performance out of it.  Fortunately for me, I already had cat 5 cable in place.

I have done many google searches but 99% of the things that I find are either 2 or more years old, or specifically for PS3.  Not that 2 year old info can't still be good, but it just seems like there should be something more recent.  The PS3 stuff just doesn't seem to work either.

Thank you for the avsforum link.  Dang that is a long one.  It starts out in 2005 and the last entry is this month.  I think I'll have to start at the bottom and work up.  :-)

If I can't get this working well, I may just have to go out and buy a NMT.  I have been reading about the HDX-1000 and the eGreat M32B.  They almost seem to be what we expected the DSM-520 to be.  They all have h.264 and dts pass-thru and all that other stuff built in. Then I wouldn't have to do any transcoding.  Or should I say recoding?

Thanks,

xeddog