Ripping Seamless Branching Discs

[stwd4nder2]

Brought this up in another thread, but figured it deserved it's own.

Is there a "best" way to rip discs that use seamless branching? There's a couple syncs I'd like to do with discs that use it, but I don't want to sync it to my rip only to have it fall out of sync with another due to MakeMKV dropping frames.

And on a side note, why is this so difficult? Appending video files seems like a relatively simple thing to do, you'd think this would be solved by now.

[BDgeek]

Yeah, this is an issue that bugs me a lot.

But the best I could find so far is DGDemux. It's constantly updated and the developer is pretty fast to solve any issues when they come out.

There's some previous discussion about it here if you look for in my previous posts.

The thing is, there's some overlapping in segments cut in branching due to DD and DTS having fixed frame sizes. If the audio was not encoded (in the original PCM) then there wouldn't be a problem at all I believe.

If there's any doubt you can drop me a PM.


But in the end, both MAKEmkv and DGDemux came a long way and when I compare rip lenghs using their latest versions, it's usually a 10ms diffence at most.

[Doctor M]

Depending on your goal, you could also try DVD Rebuilder (or BD Rebuilder if you are talking BDs) setting a disc size large enough that it won't re-encode.
Of course, I seem to remember classic old DVD Shrink not having an issues extracting seamless branched content.

[spoRv]

IIRC MakeMKV should work, but I don't use it since a long time...

[stwd4nder2]

But the best I could find so far is DGDemux. It's constantly updated and the developer is pretty fast to solve any issues when they come out.

Looks interesting. I'll try it out.

The thing is, there's some overlapping in segments cut in branching due to DD and DTS having fixed frame sizes. If the audio was not encoded (in the original PCM) then there wouldn't be a problem at all I believe.

So if I convert the audio to PCM in MakeMKV then it would come out without issues? Or is the bitstream to PCM conversion done late enough in the process where it wouldn't make a difference?

[BusterD]

I had some fairly significant sync drift when using MakeMKV on the Star Trek II UHD, but I was able to get the sync to work by using TSMuxer, thanks to Turisu.

[BDgeek]

So if I convert the audio to PCM in MakeMKV then it would come out without issues? Or is the bitstream to PCM conversion done late enough in the process where it wouldn't make a difference?

No, I think it's done later in the process, I was refering to discs containing a PCM track.

The thing is, for a segment using THD or DTS, the audio is a little longer then the video on the last frame. Since it has a fixed frame lengh that cannot be cut in the middle. So is has a little overlapping with the begining of the next segment. Due to this, the demuxers or decoders must do some sort of interpolation with the next segment. to drop de duplicate audio frame.

So in the end, each program must figure an algorithm to do this, and apparently they all use some sort of different method for it.

On DGdemux private forum, there are some discussions about it

[Beber]

Hey, audio experts.
How do you configure DGDemux to make sure the audio is okay at junctions with a seamless branching disc?
Do you check any of those boxes on the right? Or do you leave these as is, on default configuration?

[stwd4nder2]

I just use the defaults. I'm using the cli linux version, but I'd assume the default settings are all the same. Haven't noticed any issues with audio skipping with it like I have in the past with makemkv.

[Hitcher]

Hey, audio experts.
How do you configure DGDemux to make sure the audio is okay at junctions with a seamless branching disc?
Do you check any of those boxes on the right? Or do you leave these as is, on default configuration?

Let me know if that works because I had an awful time trying to rip the 181 minute version myself.

MKVToolNix GUI didn't like the audio or subtitles so I could only extract the video using it. I then had to use Handbrake on the fastest settings but with passthrough for the audio so it was untouched. Then finally MKVToolNix GUI again to merge them all back together.