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OK, I need to add more to this...
I use MakeMKV to rip stuff. When I elect to add subtitles (other than forced only) when the movie plays, the subtitles will tend to start by default, and I have to stop them through the clients UI. BUT, on the Roku, using the Mezzmo app, I get the following issues:
1) If I disable transcoding, the video will not play
2) If I enable transcoding only (leaving the subtitles options unchecked, the video plays but is being transcoded unnecessarily (and this is strictly related to subs, because I tested with video that passes muster on the audio issues mentioned above)
3) If I enable transcoding, and check the box "Stream external subtitles", the video still transcodes, does not display subtitles, and I cannot turn them on in the app.
4) If I enable "Burn subtitles into video files", the video transcodes, the subtitles are burned in, and there is no way to turn them off in the app.
In tests with Plex (which I absolutely HATE and isn't even close to Mezzmo) this is not the experience. Plex allows for subtitles to be optional, has them off by default regardless of whether or not the subtitles are "somehow" forced to on by default by the way MakeMKV rips stuff. Since most of what Plex does is under the covers, I'm sort of assuming that it does the same thing Mezzmo does, and based on the choppy video it offers, it is transcoding, but not burning the subtitles in, but rather forcing them off by default, and streaming them when needed (you can turn them on and off on the fly - I can't imagine that if Plex was burning them in that one could do this).
I'm stumped. None of this behavior happens in Kodi. I'd really like these little streaming sticks to work consistently and work well with Mezzmo, so anything that can be done to beat this up and get it to play smoothly would be awesome.
Thanks!
hsbrown2
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If the video will not play with transcoding disabled then Mezzmo will need to transcode it, the Roku may be detecting the embedded subtitles and trying to decode them and failing and this is why the video will not play with transcoding disabled.
You can try going to the properties of the file in Mezzmo and on the subtitles tab select the subtitle and then click the button to extract them and if they are text based they should then be available as external subtitles when playing the video on the Roku. Burning subtitles into the video makes them permanently part of the transcoded video image and this is why they cannot be turned off.
Kodi has much better format support compared to Roku and this is why the streaming experience is so much better. Roku only supports certain formats and codecs so Mezzmo needs to transcode more than with Kodi.
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This gets even stranger.
If I extract the subtitles, it still transcodes, and subtitles (closed captioning in the Mezzmo app?) are unavailable. I have to assume it's a format issue. It looks like the device profile only shows the Roku supports .vtt? I'm really in way deeper than I understand...
At any rate, if I disable the default embedded subtitles altogether (I'm just assuming that unchecking this option in the subs tab of the file itself treats it as though there are no subtitles), the video still transcodes. HOWEVER - if I uncheck the embedded subtitles and *disable* transcoding, then the video plays fine.
The only catch here is I am uncertain in what way this might effect forced subs. Obviously that would be detrimental to the experience if a Klingon begins speaking, since I don't speak Klingon.
The thing that gets me is that Plex seems to handle the embedded subtitles just fine. My girlfriend is a Plex fan, and I like the way Mezzmo is customizable for playlists and device experiences, and I hate that Plex is a proprietary app that stores everything in the cloud. In Plex they can be turned on and off, and it has no problems, but definitely is transcoding, which is fine, as long as there is control over the subs. I of course prefer to *not* transcode, since it can be a lossy process, but if the device doesn't work... Whaddaya gonna do?
There's definitely something wonky here though. Even with subtitles completely disabled, and using supported audio formats, Mezzmo always transcodes .mkv to the Roku Mezzmo app when transcoding is turned on.
Is there a way using a CLI I can disable subs for all the videos? Hopefully it won't kill forced subs.
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Can you please right-click on the file in Mezzmo and select 'Get FFmpeg Information...' then copy and paste this into a post here or email it to support [at] conceiva [dot] com. Possibly something other than the subtitles is causing the transcoding, if the file has DTS then it will be transcoded because of this unless you are using the Roku Streaming Player (DTS) profile (I think I sent it to you). Mezzmo can transcode the subtitles to vtt format if they are srt or another text format so that the Roku can play them. The subtitles for when a Klingon is talking are usually burned into the original video, forced subtitles like these are usually not in an external or embedded subtitle.