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POST COMPUTER PROBLEMS IN THIS THREAD ONLY

Started by Nobody Soup, February 08, 2013, 12:41:30 AM

Previous topic - Next topic

hedgehog90

Do this:
right click volume icon -> Sounds.
In the Sound window click the 'playback' tab.
It'll look like this, but with different devices to mine:



Is Microphone High Definition set as 'default device' like my speakers are? (green tick icon)
Is it set as your 'default communications device'? (green telephone icon)

If you see your speakers as a separate device, set it as your default device.
If you can now hear sound, try unplugging and plugging in the mic to check if it reverts to using Microphone High Definition as your playback device.

Neomod

Quote from: hedgehog90 on May 16, 2019, 06:27:51 PM
Did a bit of research and found it's most likely because the WD Elements disk uses a newer, less compatible partition style called GPT.

To make it work with your TV you'll need to convert it to MBR:

https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/windows-server/storage/disk-management/change-a-gpt-disk-into-an-mbr-disk

Ahh. Cheers. I'll give it a go.

Neomod


lipsink

Quote from: hedgehog90 on May 16, 2019, 10:06:28 PM
Do this:
right click volume icon -> Sounds.
In the Sound window click the 'playback' tab.
It'll look like this, but with different devices to mine:



Is Microphone High Definition set as 'default device' like my speakers are? (green tick icon)
Is it set as your 'default communications device'? (green telephone icon)

If you see your speakers as a separate device, set it as your default device.
If you can now hear sound, try unplugging and plugging in the mic to check if it reverts to using Microphone High Definition as your playback device.

Hi, no Speakers seem to be set as default device same as yours plus when I plug in the mic it was also set as Default on Playback. I just disabled the mic under Playback and now the sound seems to be working on my laptop. Thanks for you help!

Neomod

I've decided to buy a SSD for my laptop and I want to clone the contents of my present HD onto it. Do I need any special software to do this? I saw someone do it via a programme on a usb.

Also can I attach the new drive via a usb caddy like the one below for the transfer? I will use it for the old drive later.



The OS is Windows 7 professional. Ta in advance.

magval

Any MKV I download these days (from, er, friends) plays without sound on PS4. The message reads "Cannot play audio. The format is not supported."

So I'll bung the files into Handbrake, convert them to a default MP4 containerand it fixes the issue but takes hours.

Is there anything else I can do to quickly convert audio? Used to be a brilliant program called MKV2PS3 that converted MKVs to mpegs in minutes but it's no longer supported.

I'm not using streaming or home networks or anything, presently. It's all download>USB>PS4.

Thanks!

(I do buy most things, I'm not a bad cunt like)

hedgehog90

Quote from: magval on June 02, 2019, 04:31:25 PM
Any MKV I download these days (from, er, friends) plays without sound on PS4. The message reads "Cannot play audio. The format is not supported."

So I'll bung the files into Handbrake, convert them to a default MP4 containerand it fixes the issue but takes hours.

Is there anything else I can do to quickly convert audio? Used to be a brilliant program called MKV2PS3 that converted MKVs to mpegs in minutes but it's no longer supported.

I'm not using streaming or home networks or anything, presently. It's all download>USB>PS4.

Thanks!

(I do buy most things, I'm not a bad cunt like)

FFmpeg is the answer to all video encoding problems.

- Get this: https://github.com/MattMcManis/Axiom/releases/tag/v1.7.5.2-alpha
- Download 'Axiom.FFmpeg.7z' and unzip it (it uses 7z which requires WinRar or 7Zip, if you can't unzip it easily just download this zip instead which I've specially made + uploaded.
- Open Axiom.exe
- Drag your video into the input field or click the input button and navigate to your file.
- In the Format tab, for Container select 'mkv'.
- In the Video tab, for video codec select 'copy' so it doesn't convert the video track.
- In the Audio tab, select your desired audio settings.
- (Optional) Select an output file destination.
- Hit convert!

The time it takes to convert just the audio stream and remux it with the original video track is about as fast as it takes to copy the file. IOW, audio conversion is super quick.

hedgehog90

Quote from: Neomod on May 29, 2019, 06:41:37 PM
I've decided to buy a SSD for my laptop and I want to clone the contents of my present HD onto it. Do I need any special software to do this? I saw someone do it via a programme on a usb.

Also can I attach the new drive via a usb caddy like the one below for the transfer? I will use it for the old drive later.



The OS is Windows 7 professional. Ta in advance.

This video seems like a pretty good 'how to':
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7H7D1HcfY9o

- Download Macrium Reflect 7 Free Edition (Home Edition) at the top of the page: https://www.macrium.com/reflectfree
- No need to enter your email address when prompted, just click continue.
- This is just a download agent, open it to download the installer. Installer will open once downloaded.
- During installation steps, uncheck 'Register this installation of Macrium Reflect'.
- Once installed, launch the program and watch the video for instructions on cloning the drive.

If the SSD has a smaller capacity than the source drive you want to clone, you'll need to delete some stuff from the source drive first.

magval

Quote from: hedgehog90 on June 02, 2019, 05:02:52 PM
FFmpeg is the answer to all video encoding problems.

- Get this: https://github.com/MattMcManis/Axiom/releases/tag/v1.7.5.2-alpha
- Download 'Axiom.FFmpeg.7z' and unzip it (it uses 7z which requires WinRar or 7Zip, if you can't unzip it easily just download this zip instead which I've specially made + uploaded.
- Open Axiom.exe
- Drag your video into the input field or click the input button and navigate to your file.
- In the Format tab, for Container select 'mkv'.
- In the Video tab, for video codec select 'copy' so it doesn't convert the video track.
- In the Audio tab, select your desired audio settings.
- (Optional) Select an output file destination.
- Hit convert!

The time it takes to convert just the audio stream and remux it with the original video track is about as fast as it takes to copy the file. IOW, audio conversion is super quick.

Before I start, will this work on Mac OS?

(I have showed your vids to everyone I know by the way and he really liked it).

Zetetic

No. But I bet there is at least another ffmpeg GUI for Mac OS X. (Handbrake?)

Zetetic

ffworks looks like a decent equivalent for Mac, and it shouldn't be too hard to translate hedgehog90's instructions.

hedgehog90

Quote from: magval on June 02, 2019, 05:47:50 PM
Before I start, will this work on Mac OS?

No it doesn't :(
What it is though is just a GUI wrapper for a command line program called ffmpeg, which is available for mac.
There are ffmpeg GUIs for Mac, but I can't test them myself because I'm on Windows.
I'll have a quick look for some free ones.
Are you familiar with using Mac's terminal? if so you could download the mac version of ffmpeg here and I can send you a template of a command, where you just have to replace the file paths.

Quote from: magval on June 02, 2019, 05:47:50 PM
(I have showed your vids to everyone I know by the way and he really liked it).

:)

Quote from: Zetetic on June 02, 2019, 05:51:35 PM
ffworks looks like a decent equivalent for Mac, and it shouldn't be too hard to translate hedgehog90's instructions.

They expect money for their GUI wrapped opensource freeware. SCREW THEM.

Zetetic

Ah, bollocks about ffworks.

Edit: And for whatever reason, Handbrake doesn't offer passthrough video.

hedgehog90

Quote from: Zetetic on June 02, 2019, 06:03:11 PM
Edit: And for whatever reason, Handbrake doesn't offer passthrough video.

I know, and when users request the option on their github page they say 'Why on EARTH do you want THAT you SPIV?'

Anyway, magval, you just download the Mac build of ffmpeg from here:
https://ffmpeg.zeranoe.com/builds/

Download, unzip.
Open up the terminal program by hitting the big Terminal button on your desktop (this is just a guess, I don't have a Mac and I've never used one)
Then you enter a command that looks like this, but with the correct file paths, and hit Enter:

path/to/ffmpeg-download-folder/bin/ffmpeg -i "path/to/input.mkv" -c:v copy -c:a aac -b:a 160k -c:s copy "path/to/output.mkv"

-c:v copy = copy the video stream
-c:a aac = Set the audio encoding to AAC
-b:a 160k = Set the audio bitrate to 160kbps. AAC goes up to 384k, so set it to that if you're an audiophile.
-c:s copy = copy subtitles if they exist

Edit: Here's a somewhat more practical command example, assuming you've got your unzipped ffmpeg folder on your desktop, along with your input video file:

cd ~/Desktop
ffmpeg-20190601-4158865-macos64-static/bin/ffmpeg -i "input.mkv" -c:v copy -c:a aac -b:a 160k -c:s copy "output.mkv"

magval

Quote from: hedgehog90 on June 02, 2019, 05:59:08 PM

Are you familiar with using Mac's terminal?


I'm not, but I'm not bad at picking things up. I can follow any basic instructions (that don't make presumptions about familiarity) with reasonable confidence.

magval

Thanks!

Tell me this, how do I actually find the file path, and do I put it inside where you have the quotes, or in place of them?

hedgehog90

Not sure, I don't have a mac.
But if you put all of your files on your Desktop then the paths will be ~/Desktop/blah-blah-blah
If they're in your Download folder the path will be ~/Downloads/blah-blah-blah

Edit:
In your file explorer thingy, hit cmd+i on the selected file. This will bring up the info window and will show you the absolute path next to 'Where:'



Edit2: If you're not familiar the ~ is equivalent to your user folder (/Users/magval)

magval

Got it. I also had to expand the ffmpeg thing to the full file path as well.

It's running presently. What is it actually doing? Will it still be an MKV when finished?

Edit:

It's finished. The sound is all fucked-up, kinda 8-bitty.

Here's the log. Any idea what went wrong?


hedgehog90

Videos are made up of multiple streams.
Video, audio and subtitles.
This command is taking the audio stream and converting it, then combining it with the original video + subtitle streams to produce a new file.
This is much quicker than what Handbrake does, which takes the video stream too and re-encodes it completely, which also results in quality loss.

hedgehog90

Quote from: magval on June 02, 2019, 06:35:22 PM


Looks like part of the original video source is malformed. Videos encoded for the web often are.
Almost certainly won't notice anything wrong or have any problems with it, it should be fine.

magval

I'll try it again with the higher audio bitrate and see how I get on. I've a few files to mess around with anyway. Thanks very much for all your help.


NoSleep

Is ffmpegx the app to go to on a Mac? Let me check. EDIT: hasn't been updated since OS X 10.7.

hedgehog90

I came across it when I was searching for ffmpeg guis for mac earlier, it looked super basic.
It doesn't state on the download page a copy codec option so I assumed it re-encodes all streams.

NoSleep

ffmpegx? It can definitely do passthroughs because I've used it and done that. But it isn't up to date enough to recognise mkv.

magval

Wee update - none of the three files worked in the end. The first one finished converting but the audio was a mess, the other two wouldn't get started.

Any other ideas or is piracy finished forever?

hedgehog90

Bugger, sorry about that.
If you upload a snippet of video converted with MKV2PS3 I can check to see what format your PS3 wants everything to be.

Looking at the terminal output again though...



...I noticed the original file was in a webm container, which might be a problem for your PS3. Copying the video stream for this particular file might not be an option unfortunately.
h.264 video streams shouldn't be a problem though, but anything else might need to be converted.
You can check codecs and stuff with MediaInfo: https://mediaarea.net/en/MediaInfo/Download/Mac_OS

hedgehog90

The simple answer to all this though is to invest in a cheap android TV box, which you can get on ebay for £20-30.
I bought myself an X96 Mini (4GB) from AliExpress a year ago for about £20.
I installed CoreELEC on it (an operating system for running Kodi aka XBMC) and that's what I use to watch all my stuff on now.

monkfromhavana

Why are laptop power ports so shit?

For about the 5th laptop in a row (not all mine) it's knackered and I'm going to have to take it to get repaired.

It's probably a 10-minute job to replace it myself, but I'd probably blow myself up.

P.S. - what are the pros and cons of buying reconditioned laptops? I've bought all mine new from Dell, but I'm tempted by a cheaper refurb.

greencalx

Quote from: magval on June 02, 2019, 06:26:40 PM
Thanks!

Tell me this, how do I actually find the file path, and do I put it inside where you have the quotes, or in place of them?

Probably too late for this now, but if you drag a file from the Finder into the Terminal, it inserts the filename at the prompt position, properly escaped (meaning no need for quotes).