Subtitles on Philips 5000 TV and/or Xbox360

[Mushroom]

Hello,

I am evaluating Mezzmo, hoping that I may be able to replace my Toshiba StoreTV multimedia drive, which does not display subtitles properly. (It can display them, but can't handle two consecutive chars with accents, like "çã", for example - they become garbage, which is a major annoyance.)

I've set up a folder with a few AVI files and their matching *.srt files. It appears that subtitles don't work at all - I can't see them when I stream from Mezzmo using Windows Media Player, on my Xbox360, or on my new Philips Series 5000 TV set. I get the video and sound just fine, but no subtitles. I can see them perfectly when I open the files locally with Media Player Classic or Windows Media Player, as I have the VobSub DirectShow filter installed, and in both they load as expected.

First question: What must be done so I can see the subtitles on the TV or on the Xbox (which I could then see on the TV)? Is it possible to reencode the AVI on the fly, loading the VobSub filter and embed the subtitles in the picture that is being sent to those devices?

Second question: I made the "mistake" of importing my iTunes library when I set up Mezzmo on my computer. Now everytime I start the program, it chokes. By this I mean that the program becomes unresponsive at startup, freezing at the splash screen, showing "Complete." in the status line and staying like this for 250 seconds, before the interface is finally shown. I have a Core2 Duo 3 GHz, and this looks way too slow for my taste. I don't want to wait for more than 4 minutes until the software is loaded.

Third question: I have several playlists in iTunes. When I access these in my Xbox or on the TV, the tracks are shown (and played back) in alphabetical order, not in the actual order of the album or playlist in iTunes. Is there a way to play the tracks in their correct order on the devices?

Thanks in advance for your input!

[Paul]

I've set up a folder with a few AVI files and their matching *.srt files. It appears that subtitles don't work at all - I can't see them when I stream from Mezzmo using Windows Media Player, on my Xbox360, or on my new Philips Series 5000 TV set. I get the video and sound just fine, but no subtitles. I can see them perfectly when I open the files locally with Media Player Classic or Windows Media Player, as I have the VobSub DirectShow filter installed, and in both they load as expected.

First question: What must be done so I can see the subtitles on the TV or on the Xbox (which I could then see on the TV)? Is it possible to reencode the AVI on the fly, loading the VobSub filter and embed the subtitles in the picture that is being sent to those devices?

Hello,

Well, neither the TV nor the Xbox support external subtitles - that's why they're not coming up. Mezzmo does not use DirectShow at all, so we can't hook up the filter for transcoding. A future version will allow burning subtitles on to the video, so then you'll be able to see them on any client.



Second question: I made the "mistake" of importing my iTunes library when I set up Mezzmo on my computer. Now everytime I start the program, it chokes. By this I mean that the program becomes unresponsive at startup, freezing at the splash screen, showing "Complete." in the status line and staying like this for 250 seconds, before the interface is finally shown. I have a Core2 Duo 3 GHz, and this looks way too slow for my taste. I don't want to wait for more than 4 minutes until the software is loaded.

Are there any tasks in the Status Pane once Mezzmo finally starts? Also, do you have a lot of playlists/folders? If you do, there's a fixed issue where loading the library would take longer than necessary. If you'd like to try a patch, please send a message to support (at) conceiva (dot) com. You could also reset your library by deleting the Mezzmo.db and other .db files, if you wish.



Third question: I have several playlists in iTunes. When I access these in my Xbox or on the TV, the tracks are shown (and played back) in alphabetical order, not in the actual order of the album or playlist in iTunes. Is there a way to play the tracks in their correct order on the devices?

Thanks in advance for your input!
At the moment Mezzmo only allows setting the order in certain smart playlists, but this will be expanded to all playlists soon. However, some devices will re-order the files on their own, so even if Mezzmo supplies them in a certain order, it doesn't guarantee that they'll be shown/played in the same order on the device.

[Mushroom]

Well, neither the TV nor the Xbox support external subtitles - that's why they're not coming up.

Thank you for the info - that certainly explains it. The documentation for the TV is very sparse, so I wasn't sure. It looks like I have to reencode the files with VirtualDub to embed the subtitle.


Are there any tasks in the Status Pane once Mezzmo finally starts?

No, none. The IDE finally pops up and there is no task running / pending at all.


Also, do you have a lot of playlists/folders? If you do, there's a fixed issue where loading the library would take longer than necessary. If you'd like to try a patch, please send a message to support (at) conceiva (dot) com. You could also reset your library by deleting the Mezzmo.db and other .db files, if you wish.

Well, I have 62 playlists in iTunes, and about 14000 tracks. Is that too much for Mezzmo?


At the moment Mezzmo only allows setting the order in certain smart playlists, but this will be expanded to all playlists soon. However, some devices will re-order the files on their own, so even if Mezzmo supplies them in a certain order, it doesn't guarantee that they'll be shown/played in the same order on the device.

I hope that my devices keep the original order. :)

Thanks again for the info - I'll definitely will get my license next Saturday at BDJ.

[Paul]

Mezzmo should certainly handle 14000 tracks easily, but I would advise sending in a message to get the patch to check if it's fixed. The 14000 files will create quite a few dynamic playlists, so I think this is where the problem is.

[Mushroom]

Hello Dennis,

I got my license today, so I could resume testing. I did as you said, asking your guys for the patch, and I sent them a link to this thread so it would be clear what I was talking about.

In his reply, Adric asked me to download a file named 1120_Mezzmo-setup-fix_1.exe that reverted my Mezzmo installation from 2.1.11 to 1.1.2, and which caused my trial period to end abruptly. I ended up with two versions installed, and none of them working:

54

This of course I noticed only after I entered my registration details, and after Mezzmo started. I removed both versions, and reinstalled 2.1.11. Now I am back at the four minutes wait at startup.

To avoid this kind of trouble again, what file name should I ask for in order to deploy the version that actually addresses the issue I am having? Thank you.

Ulrich

[Paul]

Hello Ulrich,

That file should not have been sent out to you - it's a patch for an unsupported version. I'll make sure it doesn't happen again. Sorry for the inconveniece.

Please send a message in again and you should get the right file this time.

[Mushroom]

Hello,

I installed the new files today. Unfortunately, this brought no changes - the load time is still over 4 minutes. After just 6 seconds, the splash dialog shows "Complete." and then just hangs there. Eventually the interface is shown, and the product works, it just spends a lot of time waiting without any disk activity.

Ulrich

[Paul]

Hello Ulrich,

That would probably be a different patch - did you get a patch only for the server? You'd need a patched version of the GUI to fix the loading times issue.

[Mushroom]

Yes, I was asked download a zip file (MezzmoMediaServer-patch211121.zip) which appears to contain only the server's executable.

I really don't know what to think - I am sure that I made it perfectly clear what the issue is, and sent a link to this thread each time I asked for the patch you mentioned. It appears that again I did not receive the file you are referring to, even after your former assurance that it wouldn't happen again.

I prefer not to write here what I am thinking about this.

Ulrich

[Paul]

I'll send it to you myself - sorry for this.

[Mushroom]

Hello Dennis,

thank you for that. This file works, and brought the startup time down to 15 seconds. Much better.

Ulrich

[Paul]

Glad to help :)